Bradbury v. General Foods Corp.

• Decision Date: 11 April 1966
• Citation: 218 A.2d 673
• Court: Maine Supreme Court
• Parties: Henry BRADBURY v. GENERAL FOODS CORPORATION and Hartford Accident & Indemnity Company.

Page 673

218 A.2d 673

Henry BRADBURY v. GENERAL FOODS CORPORATION and Hartford Accident & Indemnity Company.

Supreme Judicial Court of Maine.

April 11, 1966.

Bishop & Stevens, by Albert M. Stevens, Presque Isle, for plaintiff.

Hugo A. Olore, Jr., Presque Isle, John W. Ballou, Bangor, for defendants.

Before WILLIAMSON, C. J., and WEBBER, TAPLEY, MARDEN, RUDMAN and DUFRESNE, JJ.

WEBBER, Justice.

The appellant Bradbury sought compensation as the result of an industrial accident which occurred on March 28, 1963. The issue here is whether or not the Industrial Accident Commission erred as a matter of law in awarding him compensation based on 40% partial incapacity rather than on total incapacity.

For the most part the facts are not indispute. The accident occurred while the appellant was handling a heavy motor. He suffered a sprain or strain and temporarily lost the strength of his right wrist. He reported the event and received first aid treatment from the plant nurse. X-ray pictures disclosed no fracture. He finished the work of the day and continued thereafter to work until April 22, 1963. He had some pain and swelling in the right wrist which at first subsided but later recurred. He entered the hospital shortly after April 24, 1963. His left hand and left knee had first begun to bother him just before be entered the hospital. While he was hospitalized he developed bunches on both arms and after his discharge he began to experience difficulty in the area of his neck and shoulders. By September 22, 1963 he was totally incapacitated.

The medical witnesses, Dr. White and Dr. Page, were in agreement that the claimant is suffering the typical effects of rheumatoid arthritis, a disease involving demineralization and thinning of the bone structure. They disagreed, however, as to the causal relationship between the injury on March 28, 1963 and the subsequent incapacity. Dr. White, although recognizing that the cause of the disease is unknown was of opinion that the claimant had a pre-existing but dormant arthritic condition which was activated and accelerated by the wrist injury, and thereafter 'spread like fire' to other parts of the body. The witness further stated that a 'flare-up' of the disease can be 'set off' by physical or emotional strain or even such things as sudden dampness. Dr. Page expressed his belief that the accident had nothing to do with the claimant's rheumatoid arthritis, that no one knows the cause of the disease and therefore that he did not know and could not say whether or not the incident in March contributed in any way to the subsequent manifestation of symptoms. The Commission was satisfied that the claimant had a pre-existing but quiescent condition of rheumatoid arthritis which was 'lighted up' in the area of the right wrist, hand and arm by the accident; but the Commission was not convinced that the generalized arthritis affecting other parts of the body had been shown to be so related to the wrist injury.

In essence the learned counsel for the appellant contends that the Commission was obliged as a matter of law to evaluate the testimony of these medical experts on an 'all or nothing' basis; that since it was willing to accept the conclusion of Dr. White that this injury to the right wrist could and did precipitate the acute symptoms of a hitherto dormant disease, it could not properly confine that causal relationship to the limited area of the right wrist, hand and arm but was compelled to find that the entire generalized arthritic deterioration was the result of the injury. We are not persuaded that the role of the Commission as factfinder is so restricted.

39 M.R.S.A. § 99 provides in part that a decision of the Commission 'in the absence of fraud, upon all questions of fact shall be final.' We look only to see if the decision rests on some legally competent and probative evidence and is not merely the result of speculation, conjecture or guesswork. Goldthwaite v. Sheraton Restaurant et al. (1958), 154 Me. 214, 145 A.2d 362, 79 A.L.R.2d 881; Mailman's Case (1919), 118 Me. 172, 177, 106 A. 606.

In Zoller v. Barnard, Porter, Remington & Fowler (1955), 1 A.D.2d 721, 146 N.Y.S.2d 759 the facts were so similar to those in the instant case that we quote from the opinion at length:

'One physician attributed claimant's entire disability to cerebral arteriosclerosis and gave an opinion that none of his disability was due to the industrial accident. Another physician testified that claimant did receive a head injury in the industrial accident which either caused his total disability or aggravated the arteriosclerotic changes in his brain. The Board found that claimant was permanently partially disabled as the result of the industrial accident and fixed the amount of compensation accordingly. Claimant argues that there is no competent medical testimony that only a portion of his mental difficulties resulted from the industrial accident and that the Board was required to find either that there was a total permanent disability as the result of the industrial accident or that none of the disability was caused thereby.

The Board was not required to accept or reject the whole of each medical opinion. It had the right to weigh the conflicting opinions in the light of the record as a whole and to determine that only a portion of claimant's disability was due to the industrial...