Court Opinion

ID: 9849328
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-09-24 04:38:25.795835+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T09:19:17.280782
License: Public Domain

Banke, Chief Judge,
concurring specially.
While I concur in the affirmance of the lower court’s decision denying compensation, I believe the majority’s attempt to save Ga. Bureau of Investigation v. Worthington, 149 Ga. App. 628 (255 SE2d 99) (1979), by dredging the record in that case for additional facts which do not appear in the published opinion, is both inappropriate and unavailing. Certainly, the bench and bar should be entitled to rely on the holdings set forth in our written decisions, without regard to what might or might not appear from an examination of the record in each case. In any event, with or without resort to the record in Worthington, I find our decision in that case to be in direct conflict both with our holding in the present case and with the holding in Hanson Buick, Inc. v. Chatham, 163 Ga. App. 127 (292 SE2d 428) (1982). Consequently, I would overrule it.
The claimant in Worthington maintained that he was totally incapacitated due to physical symptoms such as blurred vision, headache, and impairment of speech caused by the stress and tension of his job as a clerical employee for the Georgia Bureau of Investigation; and we affirmed an award of compensation to him based on this disability. The claimant in the present case maintains that she, too, is disabled by physical symptoms resulting from job stress and tension; and while her symptoms may perhaps be characterized as less severe than Worthington’s, that does not make them any less physical in their manifestation, nor should it be allowed to obscure the central fact that the claimant in each case alleged that his or her physical symptoms were caused purely by psychic or emotional trauma rather than by any discernible physical occurrence. After careful consideration, I can conceive of no valid basis for distinguishing Worthington from the present case.