Court Opinion

ID: 9667499
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-24 01:47:25.400312+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T15:02:14.155570
License: Public Domain

T. M. Burns, P.J.
(dissenting). Respectfully, I dissent.
In Kostamo v Marquette Iron Mining Co, 405 Mich 105, 136, 138; 274 NW2d 411 (1979), the Supreme Court stated:
"In a number of cases we have emphasized that we cannot review a decision of the WCAB as a question of the law unless its findings of fact are sufficiently detailed so that we can separate the facts it found from *784the law it applied, and that conclusory findings áre inadequate because we need to know the path it has taken through the conflicting evidence, the testimony it has adopted, the standards followed and the reasoning used to reach its conclusion.
"Because of the differing terminology of doctors and lawyers, conclusory statements concerning causation should be rejected by the WCAB, and their uncritical adoption, without examination or relation of the facts to the conclusion, should be rejected by the appellate courts.”
When addressing a compensation claim, three questions must be considered by the appeal board: 1) Is the claimant disabled? 2) If so, is the complainant disabled on account of some "personal injury”? and 3) Did the claimant’s employment aggravate, accelerate, or combine with some internal weakness or disease to produce the personal injury? Deziel v Difco Laboratories, Inc, 394 Mich 466, 476; 232 NW2d 146 (1975).
The administrative law judge who heard this case played the game condemned by Kostamo. Specifically, he found that "[t]he proofs further establish a rather substantial history of physical symptomatology thereafter, including the left shoulder”. He further noted that, "[bjenefits were paid to plaintiff on a voluntary basis through 7-5-73 when she was returned to restricted work activity”, and that again after 6-14-75, plaintiff "was returned to restricted work activity”. On the question of disability, the administrative law judge concluded, "Dr. Badgley treated plaintiff both before and after the injury of 8-10-73. And he testified rather convincingly that plaintiff does not now have a work related disability.”
These findings are troubling. They seem to say *785that plaintiff was injured, i.e., that she had a physical symptomatology, and that she was disabled, i.e., that she was returned to restricted work activities. They then jump to a denial of benefits based entirely upon Dr. Badgley’s conclusory statements concerning causation.
The appeal board adopted the administrative law judge’s findings as its own and then added: "We thus find that plaintiff’s return to restricted work was not the result of employment, but due to an illness or disease not caused or aggravated by defendant’s employment. Her debility made it impossible for her to continue employment when such restricted work was no longer available.”
Thus, the appeal board appears to find that plaintiff was disabled, i.e., that she has a debility but that her return to work "when such restricted work was no longer available” was not the result of employment. This finding is utterly unsatisfactory to explain anything.
Examining the record with the three factors of Deziel in mind, I believe that the evidence establishes without a doubt that plaintiff is disabled. In fact, the appeal board appears to infer so by stating in its opinion that she suffers from a "debility”.
Although the board’s findings on the second factor of Deziel can only charitably be described as less than clear, the evidence also convinces me that plaintiff is disabled on account of a personal injury. In this regard, plaintiff testified that she began suffering arm and shoulder pain as a result of her employment. After the pain appeared, Dr. Badgley treated her and returned her to "restricted employment”. The administrative law judge who denied plaintiff benefits found a "substantial history of physical symptomatology there*786after including the left shoulder” and noted both the medical treatment and voluntary payment of benefits to plaintiff. Although the appeal board adopted these findings of the administrative law judge, the board refused to make a clear finding on this question. Rather, the board appeared to be more concerned about discussing whether plaintiff’s "return to restricted work” was caused by employment. Whatever the purpose of the board’s concern with this point may have been, it was both factually and legally insufficient to provide the basis for denying plaintiff benefits.
The third factor of Deziel, whether the claimant’s employment aggravated, accelerated, or combined with some internal weakness or disease to produce the personal injury, must also be decided in plaintiff’s favor on the record before us. As Dr. Badgley is quoted by the appeal board as saying:
"Then on 7-3-73, she returned to work with limitation that was, I think, put on by Olds Medical, that she shouldn’t push, pull or jerk. And I note, my notes say, 8-1-73, she was okay to return to work but with no pulling of the left arm or working with the left arm above the shoulder. This condition was due to her thoracic outlet syndrome, and she was restricted from doing that kind of work so she would not have pain,”
As is clear from this evidence, plaintiff’s injuries were or could have been aggravated by her employment.
On the whole, the opinion of the board is grossly deficient because it is confusing and unsatisfactorily discusses the issues in this case. Therefore, I would remand to the appeal board and instruct it to answer the following questions:
1) Was plaintiff disabled when compensation was voluntarily paid in 1972-1973?
*7872) Was that disability caused by an underlying condition which was aggravated by her employment?
If the appeal board were to answer these two questions in the affirmative, as would appear likely based upon the evidence in the record before us, then the board should consider a third question: 3) whether plaintiffs disability continues or, if not, ascertain when it ceased.
Parenthetically, I would hold that the existence of plaintiffs August 10, 1973, automobile accident is not relevant to the question of whether she is entitled to benefits. If a claimant is partially disabled by a condition aggravated by work, the existence of an intervening nonwork-related trauma does not render the prior disability noncompensable. Medacco v Campbell, Wyant & Cannon Foundry Co, 48 Mich App 217; 210 NW2d 360 (1973). This principle of law is especially true in the instant case where the only evidence on this matter, the testimony of Dr. Badgley, clearly indicates that plaintiff was completely recovered from the effects of the automobile accident when he released her for work on May 14, 1975.
I dissent and would remand this case to the Workers’ Compensation Appeal Board with instructions to conduct further fact-finding and clarify its prior opinion.