Court Opinion

ID: 9656179
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-23 19:41:30.682728+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:13:29.844040
License: Public Domain

*253MEYER, Justice
(dissenting).
I respectfully dissent. The school district’s position, adopted by the majority, removes the compensation judge’s discretion from the statute, is inconsistent with the function of a medical examination in the resolution of medical questions, and undermines the legislative plan for the efficient delivery of compensation to injured workers. I would conclude that the statute is not clear and free from all ambiguity, and that it should more reasonably be read as providing for the mandatory appointment of a neutral physician only when there is a genuine need for such evidence.
Minnesota Statutes § 176.155, subd. 2 (2006), makes the appointment of a physician both discretionary and mandatory upon the request of an interested party. The statute provides:
In each case of dispute as to the injury the commissioner of labor and industry, or in case of a hearing the compensation judge conducting the hearing, or the Workers’ Compensation Court of Appeals if the matter is before it, may with or without the request of any interested party, designate a neutral physician to make an examination of the injured worker * * *, and further provided that when an interested party requests, not later than 30 days prior to a scheduled prehearing conference, that a neutral physician be designated, the compensation judge shall make such a designation.
Minn.Stat. § 176.155, subd. 2 (emphasis added). The statute further provides that the compensation judge “may request the neutral physician to answer any particular question with reference to the medical phases of the case.” Id. (emphasis added).9 In my view, reading the “shall make ” language as mandatory upon timely request effectively extinguishes the discretion conferred through the “may with or without the request” clause. Moreover, to mandate an additional medical examination whenever the self-insured employer or insurance carrier makes a timely request seriously impedes the overarching intent of the legislature in providing medical and wage-loss compensation quickly and efficiently at a reasonable cost to employers10 and is problematic in its implementation.11
The rule in this state is that a conflict in expert medical testimony must be resolved *254by the factfinder. Nord v. City of Cook, 360 N.W.2d 337, 342 (Minn.1985). The neutral-physician examination statute was therefore designed to vest in the compensation judge “the discretionary power to appoint a neutral physician when, in the exercise of its judicial discretion, it would be needful or desirable in arriving at a decision.” See Hosking v. Metropolitan House Movers Corp., 272 Minn. 390, 397, 138 N.W.2d 404, 408 (1965). The study commission’s recommendation, from which the 1979 amendment was drawn, contemplated “a check on the inconsistency of medical testimony and a means to provide a resolution of genuinely disputed medical issues which are beyond the capacity of the court to resolve.” Minnesota Workers’ Compensation Study Commission, A Report to the Legislature and Governor 37-38 (1979).12 As a corollary, it seems to me that the neutral-physician examination provision would have no justifiable application in the common medical-causation dispute.13 I believe the more reasonable construction of the statute, that gives meaning to all terms and effectuates legislative intent, is that the compensation judge has discretion to appoint a neutral physician upon request made at any time, but that such appointment is mandatory upon timely request only when genuinely disputed medical issues are inherently complex. I would affirm.

. In addition, any party "may demand that the physician be produced for purposes of cross-examination.” Minn.Stat. § 176.155, subd. 2. And, "[t]he expense of the examination shall be paid as ordered by the * * * compensation judge.” Id. However, there is no funding mechanism for the additional medical examination and no provision for the expense of the physician’s cross-examination.

. Minnesota Statutes § 176.001 (2006) provides that "[i]t is the intent of the legislature that chapter 176 be interpreted so as to assure the quick and efficient delivery of indemnity and medical benefits to injured workers at a reasonable cost to the employers who are subject to the provisions of this chapter.”

. As the WCCA observed:
In most cases, the resolution of a medical issue depends not solely on the opinion of the doctor but upon the testimony of witnesses and upon the credibility attached by the compensation judge to those witnesses. Typically, an attorney for one party or the other will provide these facts to an examining doctor in a hypothetical question. Absent any rules governing the utilization of a neutral physician, we do not know what factual information would be communicated to a neutral physician, particularly when the examination occurs prior to the hearing. Presumably, the compensation judge could not do so until the judge has heard the evidence. We further note there is no designated list of neutral physicians or any rules establishing procedures for the appointment of a neutral physician.
Reider v. Anoka-Hennepin Sch. Dist. No. II, No. WC05-276, 2006 WL 1977512, at *9 (Minn. WCCA June 21, 2006).

. There are situations in which expert opinion as to cause and effect may be desirable, but it is not always essential given other reliable evidence. See Reimer v. Minnit Tool/ M.I.T. Tool Corp., 520 N.W.2d 397, 398 (Minn.1994) (holding that medical opinion connecting return of carpal tunnel syndrome-type symptoms to postinjury employment was not essential). On the other hand, expert testimony is deemed indispensable when the question is complicated and “carries the fact-finders into realms that are properly within the province of medical experts." 7 Arthur Larson & Lex K. Larson, Larson’s Workers' Compensation Law § 128.05(1) (2006) (summarizing cases on basic rule when medical testimony is indispensable); see, e.g., Stevens v. Computer Metal Prods., Inc., 312 N.W.2d 450, 453 (Minn.1981) (holding that expert medical opinion essential to causal relationship between work injury and ongoing disability). "Since the underlying reason for the rule requiring medical evidence in this class of cases is the inherent complexity of the medical question involved, it follows logically that when the medical problem becomes sufficiently abstruse, the rule can be satisfied only by corresponding expertise in the medical witness * * ⅞.” Larson & Larson, supra, § 128.05(8). "[A]s the degree of complexity of the medical issue increases, so does the degree of requisite thoroughness and definiteness of [expert medical opinion regarding] diagnosis.” Id., § 128.05(9).

. As the WCCA observed, the neutral-physician statute was not meant “to give a party the right to an additional medical expert.” Reider, 2006 WL 1977512, at *8. The employee is already obligated to submit to a medical examination by the employer’s physician. Minn.Stat. § 176.155, subd. 1 (2006). It seems to me most unlikely that the legislature intended to compel an additional medical examination in the absence of some legitimate need for such evidence in the accurate determination of the disputed medical question.