Court Opinion

ID: 9532714
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-07 04:24:11.832793+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T13:28:49.475843
License: Public Domain

Lotterhos, J.,
dissenting:
It is my view that the Court has misinterpreted that section of the workmen’s compensation act applicable to hernia, and -is in error in reversing the commission and the court below in this case. The sole question presented on this appeal is whether the Court shall find as a matter of law that the statute is complied with when the claimant, admittedly having failed to submit himself to a physician or surgeon readily available to him within five days after the injury, testifies that he suffered pain, remained in bed, and made one telephone call to a doctor within the five days provided by the statute.
*449I think this case is controlled by Meador v. Dollar Store, Miss., 64 So. 2d 574, and I also am of the opinion that the Meador case correctly interpreted the purpose and intention of the legislature in laying down requirement number five for hernia eases. Sec. 6998-12, Code of 1942, (Yol. 5-A, recompiled) contains the applicable statute (Sec. 8 (f) of Chap. 354, Laws of 1948, as amended by Sec. 6 (f) of Chap. 412, Laws of 1950). That section has been quoted in the majority opinion.
The question for consideration is what is meant by the provision that the physical distress must be “such as to require the attendance of a licensed physician or surgeon within five (5) days after the injury.” The word “require” has several definitions as shown in the majority opinion. It is also defined by current dictionaries as “to demand” or “to impose a compulsion upon; compel.” It seems to me that the legislature used the word in this sense rather than with a less compelling meaning. In common practice, if a man is injured' or is ill to the extent of requiring a doctor, he proceeds then to obtain the services of a doctor, provided one can be found. When one says, “I have been sick and I required the services of a physician” or “My illness required the attendance of a doctor,” everyone understands that he has had a doctor to call upon him. If the legislature, in laying down particular requirements in the case of hernia, had intended that it need only be shown that it would have been desirable to have a doctor, it would not have found it necessary to include requirement number five, because the other four requirements would have amounted to substantially the same thing. Even without requirement number five, the claimant must show that there was a descent or protrusion immediately after the injury, that there was severe pain, and that the physical distress was noticed immediately. The effect of the present decision is that when those things are shown it conclusively follows that the at*450tendance of a licensed physician or surgeon was required within five days, even though the claimant did not obtain such services when he could easily have done so.
It is to be noted that the original provision in the 1948 statute was that the physical distress must require the attendance of a physician within forty-eight hours, and the 1950 statute, in liberalizing the requirements, extended the time to five days. Why was it necessary to extend the time from forty-eight hours to five days if it is actually not necessary to show the attendance of a physician at all? The legislature no doubt recognized that there would be cases in which a hardship might be imposed upon a claimant but it realized that some positive and easily proved criterion had to be established in hernia cases so that in the average instance the commission and the courts would have something tangible to use as a basis for passing upon these claims.
I think that this Court has already established the correct interpretation of the statute in the Meador case and that we should not now depart from the interpretation so given. In spite of the slight differences between the two cases, upon which the Court has attempted to make a distinction, this Court fully considered the proposition involved here when the Meador case was before it. The Court recognized in that case, as shown by the latter part of the portion of the opinion to be herein quoted, that instances might arise in which a claimant ought to be excused from having the actual attendance of a doctor within five days. It was thought that, for example, a man might be injured at some isolated place where on account of weather conditions or otherwise it would be practically impossible to get him to a doctor within the period allowed. But the court did not at that time feel that a man could remain within telephone call and easy transportation distance of numerous doctors, and, after waiting more than a *451week to see a doctor, then successfully claim that his “physical distress” was such as “to require the attendance of a licensed physician or surgeon within five (5) days after the injury.” Without further discussion, I quote a substantial part of the opinion in the case of Meador v. Dollar Store, supra, as follows:
“Paragraph 5 provides that a claimant must show by a preponderance of the evidence ‘That the physical distress following the descent or protrusion of the hernia or rupture was such as to require the attendance of a licensed physician or surgeon within five (5) days after the injury for which compensation is claimed.’ The 1948 Act, Section 8 (f), required the attendance of a physician ‘within forty-eight (48) hours after such occurrence’ of hernia. The 1950 amendment, applicable here, extended that period to ‘five (5) days after the injury.’ The undisputed facts show that appellant was injured on December 12 or 13, and that he did not have a physician attend or examine him until December 21, eight or nine days after the injury. The doctor’s visit was occasioned by appellant complaining of the flu, and not of a hernia, although on that visit appellant complained also of a severe pain in his right side. However, we will assume that the physician’s examination of December 21 constitutes the ‘attendance’ of a physician within the statute. But that event did not occur within five days after the appellant’s injury, as the statute requires, .so appellant has failed to comply with this statutory test governing the basic compensability of hernias. 1 Larson, Workmen’s Compensation Law (1952), Section 39.70.
“In order to bring himself within this fifth requirement, appellant argues that he complied with it as far as was humanly and physically possible; that appellant went home and was placed in bed with the flu immediately after the severe pain in his side, and remained there until examined by the doctor on December 21 and again on December 29; and that the doctor testified that when *452lie called on -appellant on the 21st appellant had been ill with the flu about two or three days before that date. However, the record fails to show that appellant went to bed with the flu immediately after his injury on December 12 or 13, and fails to show that he remained there until examined by his physician on the, 21st. Nor would that fact, if it existed, suffice as an excuse for failure to comply with the statutory requirement. It may be that the fifth requirement of the act, that there must be the attendance of a physician within five days after the injury, is a difficult one for a claimant to meet, but that is a matter for the Legislature. We must interpret the statute as it is written.
“This is not a question of notice of injury, which is dealt with in paragraph 4 of Section 8 (f). The Legislature, for reasons apparently related to the need for immediate medical diagnosis and the earliest possible investigation of facts surrounding the injury, requires in paragraph 5 that the physical distress following the hernia must be such as to require a physician’s attendance within five days after the injury. The date of the injury was the date on which the disability manifested itself, December 12 or 13, according to appellant’s own testimony. 1 Larson, Workmen’s Compensation Law, Secs. 39.50 and 42.11. The attendance of a physician was not required until eight or nine days thereafter. The statute states that that event ‘shall’ occur within five days after the injury. We need not speculate as to whether some conceivable circumstances might constitute an excuse for the attendance of a physician occurring after the five-day period. Compare 2 Larson, Secs. 78.40-78.42, excuses for late notice or claim. It is sufficient here to observe that appellant’s evidence fails to indicate any reason why paragraph 5 should not apply to him.”
In order to apply what has been said above to the case at bar, I will set out here the applicable facts in the present record. J. C. Lindsey, the appellant, lived *453in Pascagoula, Mississippi, which is the same city in which the injury occurred. His injury occurred about thirty minutes before quitting time on Monday, June 9, 1952. He testified that at that time he “had contracted a pretty severe pain,” which was in his stomach. He stated that he told his superior that he “needed to go to the First-Aid. ’ ’ He did not go to the first-aid station, however, but went to his home that Monday afternoon and remained there until the following Monday, June 16, at which time he reported to the first-aid station of his employer, and from there was sent to the company doctor, who diagnosed his injury as a hernia.
Now with reference to what his condition was between June 9 and June 16 and with respect to whether his physical distress was such during that period as to require the attendance of a physician, I will quote all of the testimony in the record, which comes from the claimant himself, he being the only witness on that phase of the case:
“Q. What did you do at quitting time?
“A. I didn’t do anything but gather up my tools and went on out just like the rest of them did.
“Q. Did you go on home?
“A. Yes, sir.
“Q. Now, Mr. Lindsey, did you call, what happened to you after you got home?
“A. Well, it was paining me very had at that time and I told my wife call Dr. Minkler and she called him.
“Q. Is that your family doctor?
“A. Yes, sir, and she called him and he was out. He was not there.
‘ ‘ Q. All right, sir. And when did you, when did you, did you go back to work the next day, Mr. Lindsey ?
“A. No, sir, I didn’t.
“Q. How long did you remain off?
“A. I was off until the next Monday.
“Q. And what did you do the next Monday, Mr. Lindsey?
*454“A. I went back to the yard and reported to my foreman I bad to go to First Aid and see a doctor.
“ Q. Did they send you to First Aid ?
“A. Yes, sir.
“Q. They sent you to a doctor?
“A. Yes, sir, First Aid, sent me on.”
* # =K= # # #
“Q. You went on borne? You lived in Pascagoula at that time?
“A. Yes, sir.
“Q. You told your wife to call Dr. Minkler?
“A. Yes, sir.
“Q. What time was that?
“A. Well, that was, I suppose, around five o’clock, five-thirty, I don’t know exactly.
“Q. Did she call at his office?
“A. Yes, sir.
££Q. He was not in?
“A. No, sir.
“Q. Did she call his home?
“A. No, sir, he was out of town that day.
££Q. When did they say he would be back?
“A. Well, the girl told my wife, I believe, he was out for a week. I am not sure.
££Q. So, then, that was Monday. You didn’t go back to work the rest of that week? You had four working days that week?
“A. Four working days.
££Q. Your regular shift was on at the plant that week? ££A. Yes, sir.
££Q. You did not go back to the plant at all that week ?
“A. Not until the next Monday.
££Q. You did not go to the doctor that week?
££A. No, sir.”
££Q. Mr. Lindsey, from the time that you went home from work on June 9th, that Monday evening, did you, *455did you or did you not remain at the house during the following period of time up until the next Monday morning you went down and Dr. Weatherford and Dr. Lockard examined you in the Ingalls Shipyard Hospital?
“A. Yes, sir, I did, I went home that evening and taken a bath and examined the knot again, and I got cleaned up, I went to bed, stayed in bed.
“Q. Did you stay in bed most of the time?
“A. Most of the time, yes, sir.”
It can be noted that very slight effort was made to obtain the services of a doctor, the only testimony being that the claimant had his wife call his family physician and that she was advised that he was out of town for a week. But what about other available doctors? It was shown that there were three company doctors, who had a clinic in Pascagoula, their names being Dr. Lockard, Dr. Weatherford, and Dr. Fredrie. It was further shown that the names of other doctors engaged in the active practice of medicine in the City of Pascagoula in addition to the three company doctors were as follows: Dr. Minkler, Dr. McDonald, Dr. Mcllwain, Dr. Hicks and Dr. Cameron.
With eight doctors available in Pascagoula, I do not see how it can be said that the claimant’s physical distress was such as to require the attendance of a doctor, when he admits that he did not call in any of these doctors to examine him or treat him or relieve his pain after it was reported to him that Dr. Minkler was out of town.
Roberds, P. J., joins in this dissent.