Court Opinion

ID: 9648648
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-23 14:31:27.637764+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T09:07:42.923057
License: Public Domain

*422Justice EAKIN
dissenting.
We accepted review of this case to determine whether a claim petition or review petition is the proper filing to add injuries that arise subsequent to the original injury. Unlike the majority, I do not believe a claimant may merely file an amendatory review petition in order to receive benefits for injuries not included in the original NCP. Unless these arise as a natural consequence of the original injury, I believe the law requires filing of a new claim petition for injuries not accepted by the employer in the original NCP. See AT & T v. Workers’ Compensation Appeal Bd. (Hernandez), 707 A.2d 649, 650 n. 2 (Pa.Cmwlth.1998) (claim petition must be filed when seeking benefits for additional injuries).1
Pursuant to § 413(a) of the Workers’ Compensation Act, a WCJ may only amend the NCP when it is materially incorrect or when an employee’s disability has increased. See 77 P.S. § 771-772; Westinghouse Elec. Corp./CBS v. Workers’ Compensation Appeal Bd. (Burger), 838 A.2d 831, 837 (Pa.Cmwlth. 2003) (“Section 413(a) of the Act requires the moving party to prove that a disability has ‘increased,’ and to prove the causal relationship between the original injury and the amending disability.”). Here, no material mistake of fact existed; claimant’s shoulder injury, fibromyalgia, and depression were not claimed at the time the NCP was issued, and they are not “increases” of the claimed injury. As the employer did not (indeed, could not) acquiesce to liability for these unclaimed ailments, there was no mistake in excluding them. Any “mistake” lies in claimant’s failure to mention them until years later when employer alleged an end to the only injury of which it had notice.
Requiring a claim petition allows the procedure contemplated by the statute to take place, with full and timely attention to the claim. This also prevents the unfair result here— *423employer had no notice of these claimed injuries until years after the fact, yet must address them as mere “amendments” claimed only upon cessation of the original injury. Requiring a claimant to give notice to the employer within two years of these additional injuries is explicitly called for by the statute, for reasons of fundamental fairness. This basic requirement is hardly onerous to claimant. Allowing new claims for a different, long-standing injury is not a mere modification. Claimant was not alleging her original low -back disability had increased, and the subsequent injuries were not a natural consequence of the low back disability; accordingly, the WCJ had no authority to amend the NCP.
Therefore, I am compelled to dissent.

. The exception announced in Campbell v. Workers’ Compensation Appeal Bd. (Antietam Valley Animal Hospital), 705 A.2d 503, 507 (Pa.Cmwlth.1998), is inapplicable where there was no indication that the subsequent injuries arose as a natural consequence of the original injury.