Court Opinion

ID: 9595974
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-22 00:44:54.264821+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T09:07:28.721253
License: Public Domain

TOM Glaze, Justice, dissenting. The majority opinion tice, may be an equitable decision in awarding benefits to Renate Hapney, but in doing so, it utilizes a rather odd interpretation and definition of the term “back,” as that term is employed in Ark. Code Ann. § ll-9-102(5)(A)(ii)(b) (Supp. 1999). Under the workers’ compensation statute, a worker sustains a compensable injury if the injury is a back injury which is not caused by a specific incident or which is not identifiable by time and place of occurrence. In the present case, it is undisputed that Hapney sustained a neck and cervical spine injury, but the statute in issue makes no mention of a neck injury. Nonetheless, the majority opinion says the word “back” includes a neck injury, even though in common medical parlance “back” is defined as the posterior aspect of the trunk, below neck and above buttocks. See PDR Medical Dictionary, 1st Edition (1995). Similarly, “back” is defined in the SloaneDorland Annotated Medical-Legal Dictionary (1987) as the posterior part of the trunk from the neck to the pelvis. See also Stedman’s Medical Dictionary, 26th Edition (1995) (posterior aspect of trunk, below neck and above buttocks). In considering the meaning of the term “back” as employed in § ll-9-102(5)(A)(ii)(b), its accepted definition includes that part of the posterior aspect of the trunk below the neck, and this court’s duty on review of this case is to accept that meaning. See, e.g., Nelson v. Timberline Int’l, Inc., 332 Ark. 165, 964 S.W.2d 357 (1998). The majority opinion injects needless ambiguity to the reading of the statute by discussing the term “spine” — a word that is not found in the statute. Clearly, a person’s neck and back are a part of the spine, but that has nothing to do with this court’s duty to fairly interpret the term “back” used in § 11 -9-102 (A) (ii) (b). If the General Assembly had intended to include neck injuries, it could easily have done so. The majority further confuses matters by citing a Kentucky case, Newberg v. Thomas Indus., 852 S.W.2d 339 (Ky. App. 1993). There, the Kentucky Court of Appeals, in construing a Kentucky statute liberally, concluded “back” shall include cervical spine injuries.1 (Emphasis added.) Arkansas law requires a different standard of review than Kentucky’s, since Ark. Code Ann. § 11-9-704(c)(3) provides that administrative law judges, the Commission, and any reviewing court shall construe the provisions of our workers’ compensation provisions strictly. (Emphasis added.) The General Assembly gave further definition, in Ark. Code Ann. § 11 — 9— 1001 (Repl. 1996), to what is meant by strict construction, stating “if such things as . . . the extent to which any physical condition, injury, or disease should be excluded from or added to coverage by the law, or the scope of the workers’ compensation statutes need to be liberalized, broadened, or narrowed, those things shall be addressed by the General Assembly and should not be done by an administrative law judge, the Workers’ Compensation Commission, or the courts.” In the instant case, the General Assembly provided for benefits for gradual onset injuries to the back, but omitted mention of such benefits for injuries to the neck. As I read the law, the General Assembly has reserved to itself the authority to either exclude or add coverage under the Workers’ Compensation Law. To reiterate, the Kentucky court in the Newberg decision reviewed an employee’s claim for benefits by liberally construing that state’s workers’ compensation statutes. While our state Workers’ Compensation Law, prior to 1993, entitled employee-claimants to a broad and liberal construction, that rule of construction changed with the General Assembly’s enactment of Act 796 of 1993, as is evidenced by the reading of §§ ll-9-704(c) and 11-9-1001 discussed above. In sum, the Commission was not wrong in denying Ms. Hapney’s claim for a gradual onset injury to her neck, because such an injury is not specifically provided for under Arkansas’s statute that defines compensable accidental injury. While I believe the 1993 workers’ compensation provision, § 11-9-102, must be read to exclude a neck injury, that interpretation does not necessarily preclude an employee’s ability to file a legal action in court for damages on account of the injury. See Ark. Code Ann. § ll-9-105(b)(l) (Repl. 1996). Moreover, it appears to me that, considering the restrictive nature by which the General Assembly has now defined a compensable injury, it may be that an employee’s remedy will likely often He in filing suit for damages rather than seeking a remedy under the Workers’ Compensation Law. For example, under prior law, a compensable injury meant only accidental injury arising out of and in the course of employment.2 Under present law, an accidental injury exists only if it is caused by a specific incident and is identifiable by time and place of occurrence. (Emphasis added.) Obviously, with such restrictive language, workers may only be able to seek and obtain relief by filing suits for damages. Surely workers cannot be left without a remedy, at least in situations where the worker can show that his or her injury was negligently caused by the employer. With such restrictive provisions designed to remove an indeterminable number of injuries from coverage under the Workers’ Compensation Law, the General Assembly seems to depart from the law’s purpose which was to change the common law by shifting the burden of all work-related injuries from individual employers and employees to the consuming public. See Vanderpool v. Fidelity & Cas. Inc. Co., 327 Ark. 407, 939 S.W.2d 280 (1997); Simmons First Nat’l Bank v. Thompson, 285 Ark. 275, 686 S.W.2d 415 (1985). When the Workers’ Compensation Law was enacted, employees were compelled to give up the chance of recovering unlimited damages in fault-related cases in return for a certain recovery in all work-related cases. Simmons, 285 Ark. at 279, 686 S.W.2d at 417. Eventually, the General Assembly may well discover that the 1993 Act containing the restrictive language redefining compensable accidental injury will lead to unwanted lawsuits for damages — which was the very vice the Workers’ Compensation Law was designed to eliminate. BROWN, J., joins this dissent.   The Kentucky case in part relied on the American Medical Association’s Guides to the Evaluation of Permanent Impairment, which is used to evaluate workers’ disabilities. Under the Guidesy approach to impairment evaluation, the spine is considered to be equivalent to a unit of the whole person and includes the cervical, thoracic, and lumbar regions. While the entire spine may be separated into three regions for evaluation-of-impairment purposes, such guidelines do not establish liability of an employer for a gradual onset injury to a worker’s back or neck.    Injury also included occupational diseases and infections arising out of an in the course of employment. See Ark. Stat. Ann. § 81-1302 (Repl. 1976).