What the panel ordered
WCAB panel decision after reconsideration affirms WCJ Findings and Order denying compensability of back injury and cumulative trauma, and denying permanent disability and medical treatment benefits
Petition for Reconsideration filed by applicant after WCJ Findings and Order denying compensability and benefits; WCAB panel decision after reconsideration affirming WCJ decision
What was disputed, and how it came out
Each issue the panel decided, with the reasoning it gave. An outcome is what this panel did on this record — not a rule, and not a prediction.
The WCJ and WCAB found no substantial evidence to establish industrial causation of the spinal cord hemorrhage and paralysis, relying on the agreed medical evaluator Dr. Anderson's opinion that causation was not more likely than not, despite reasonable doubt and timing coincidence.
From the decision · page 2374); that applicant testified he worked for the same employer as a carpenter for seven years without back pain limitation, but within five days of twisting his back when a piece of wood slipped from his grasp and he fell and sustained the compensable right knee injury, a pre-existing but asymptomatic spinal cyst ruptured causing spinal cord hemorrhage and paralysis; that the neurologic agreed medical evaluator (AME) Wayne Anderson, M.D., testified that although he retained a reasonable doubt about the mechanism that caused the spinal cord hemorrhage, he would find some industrial causation if the WCJ determined that reasonable doubt were to be resolved in applicant's favor; that no substantial evidence was presented to establish an alternative mechanism of the spinal cord hemorrhage; and, that the WCJ erred when determining compensability by placing a mistaken burden on applicant to establish "precise causation" of the mechanism of the spinal cord hemorrhage.