LANSING, Mich. (Legal Newsline) - Michigan’s highest court overruled a test workers’ compensation officials have been using for years to assess whether plaintiffs have proven work-related mental injuries, saying it was biased against claimants and contradicted by state law.
The decision came in the case of a nursing home worker who claimed she suffers seizures and post-traumatic stress disorder after being electrocuted and falling from a ladder at work. One justice dissented, saying the plaintiff’s thinly supported claims – doctors could find no evidence of brain injuries after 12 days of continuous monitoring – made her case “a decidedly poor vehicle to consider altering longstanding standards” for assessing mental injury claims.
A majority on the Michigan Supreme Court ruled otherwise, finding that the Michigan Compensation Appellate Commission’s 2002 decision Martin v Pontiac School District had started out as a guide but had “morphed into a straitjacket.” That decision established a four-part test to determine whether a plaintiff’s injuries stemmed in “a significant manner” from a work-related incident or were primarily due to prior trauma or a preexisting condition. The court substituted a “totality of factors” test that gives less weight to nonoccupational causes.
Agnes Cramer was the dietary manager for Transitional Health Services of Wayne, a nursing home. She was electrocuted and fell off a ladder in 2012 while wiping off an electrical fixture. She was taken to the hospital complaining of pain and confusion but the hospital released her and cleared her for work after finding no injuries.
Cramer returned to work but claimed she felt dizzy and disoriented and a neurological clinic diagnosed her with a concussion. She reported having seizures, although she received normal test results from an electroencephalogram (EEG). A neurophysiologist, Dr. Mariana Spanaki-Varalas, later diagnosed Cramer with “nonepileptic” seizures caused by stress, not a brain abnormality, as well as post-traumatic stress disorder and depression.
A magistrate judge rejected Cramer’s claims for lack of evidence, after the plaintiff acknowledged other stressors including physical and emotional abuse by her ex-husband. She also said she was disowned by her mother, church and friends and lost custody of her children after she divorced. Her experts said the sole cause of her problems was the electrocution and fall, while defense expert Dr. Manfred F. Greiffenstein said she had “pseudo-seizures” and a fall from a ladder wasn’t enough to cause such a severe physical and mental response.
Cramer appealed to the Michigan Compensation Appellate Commission on the single question of whether Martin was consistent with the workers’ comp statute. The Commission affirmed the ruling and held Martin is valid. But the Michigan Supreme Court reversed and remanded her case, ordering the magistrate to reconsider using a broader analysis of whether her condition was aggravated or accelerated by the fall.
“There is no dispute that plaintiff endured difficult challenges and tragedies in her life prior to the accident,” the court said. “Despite these challenges, there is no evidence in the record that plaintiff had experienced seizures or took any time off work between her divorce and the workplace fall as a result of these past experiences.”
Justice Brian K. Zahra dissented, joined by Justice David F. Viviano, saying “this case is a a decidedly poor vehicle to consider altering longstanding standards addressing the contribution, aggravation, or acceleration of a preexisting mental disability.”
There was no evidence, other than Cramer’s recollection, that she was electrocuted, hit her head or suffered a shoulder injury, the justice wrote.
“Clearly, had plaintiff arrived at the hospital after having suffered those injuries, there would be some indication of a head injury in the medical records,” he wrote. “To the contrary, the hospital’s assessment and plan upon discharge stated, `after the whole assessment and work up, therefore it appears patient has escaped from any major injury or trauma to herself, will be going home most probably.’”
He also criticized the majority for ignoring another part of the workers comp statute which requires reviewing courts to accept all the findings of the Commission as fact.