Howard Univ. Hosp. v. Dept. of Emp. Serv., No. 04-AA-397.

• Decision Date: 20 November 2008
• Docket Number: No. 04-AA-397.,No. 07-AA-785.,No. 04-AA-399.,No. 07-AA-784.
• Citation: 960 A.2d 603
• Parties: HOWARD UNIVERSITY HOSPITAL, et al., Petitioner (in Nos. 04-AA-397, 07-AA-784 & 07-AA-785), and MaryAnne Tagoe, Petitioner (in No. 04-AA-399), v. DISTRICT OF COLUMBIA DEPARTMENT OF EMPLOYMENT SERVICES, Respondent.
• Court: D.C. Court of Appeals

960 A.2d 603

HOWARD UNIVERSITY HOSPITAL, et al., Petitioner (in Nos. 04-AA-397, 07-AA-784 & 07-AA-785), and MaryAnne Tagoe, Petitioner (in No. 04-AA-399), v. DISTRICT OF COLUMBIA DEPARTMENT OF EMPLOYMENT SERVICES, Respondent.

No. 04-AA-397.

No. 04-AA-399.

No. 07-AA-784.

No. 07-AA-785.

District of Columbia Court of Appeals.

Argued May 31, 2006.

Decided November 20, 2008.

John F. Ward, for petitioner, Howard University Hospital.

MaryAnne Tagoe, pro se.

Robert J. Spagnoletti and Edward E. Schwab, respectively Attorney General and Deputy Attorney General for the District of Columbia at the time of argument, filed a statement in lieu of brief for respondent.

Before RUIZ, GLICKMAN and FISHER, Associate Judges.

GLICKMAN, Associate Judge:

Howard University Hospital and MaryAnne Tagoe petition for review of a decision by the Department of Employment Services ("DOES") on Tagoe's worker's compensation claim, which she filed after suffering a stroke while working as a physician in the Hospital's residency program. The Administrative Law Judge ("ALJ") who conducted the evidentiary hearing found that Tagoe's stroke and ensuing migraines were work-related, her failure to give timely written notice of her injury was excused, but she had not become disabled within the meaning of the Workers' Compensation Act. Accordingly, the ALJ awarded Tagoe her medical expenses but denied her claim for disability compensation and vocational rehabilitation benefits. The Director of DOES affirmed the ALJ's compensation order. After hearing oral argument on the parties' review petitions, we remanded the record for supplemental proceedings. The record was returned to us on July 6, 2007, and we have since received additional briefs from petitioners. Their petitions for review (in Nos. 04-AA-397 and 04-AA-399) are now ready for decision.¹

In its petition, the Hospital contends that the DOES erred in excusing Tagoe's failure to give timely notice of her injury. We agree with that contention, which means that Tagoe's claim for disability compensation (though not her claim for medical and vocational rehabilitation benefits) is barred. For her part, Tagoe complains of certain rulings admitting or excluding evidence, and of the agency's rejection of her claim for vocational rehabilitation. We conclude that Tagoe's claims entitle her to no relief.

I. Standard of Review

In accordance with the District of Columbia Administrative Procedure Act,² we are authorized to set aside the DOES decision in this worker's compensation case if it is unsupported by substantial evidence in the record or otherwise not in accordance with law. To pass muster, "(1) the decision must state findings of fact on each material, contested factual issue; (2) those findings must be based on substantial evidence; and (3) the conclusions of law must follow rationally from the findings."³ Our application of the "substantial evidence" test, which requires "such relevant evidence as a reasonable mind might accept as adequate to support a conclusion,"⁴ is deferential to the ALJ's fact-finding prerogatives.⁵ Similarly, though in general we review de novo the legal conclusions of the Director and his surrogate, the Compensation Review Board ("CRB"),⁶ we acknowledge their expertise and DOES's responsibility for administering the Workers' Compensation Act. Hence, we ordinarily must defer to their reasonable interpretations of ambiguous provisions in that legislation.⁷

II. The Duty to Furnish Timely Notice of Injury

In June 2000, after having earned a medical degree in Ghana, MaryAnne Tagoe commenced a one-year transitional residency program at Howard University Hospital. On October 4, 2000, while on a rotation with the cardiothoracic vascular surgery unit, Tagoe suffered what was described in her medical records as a "cerebral artery occlusion with cerebral infarction" — in other words, a stroke. Her treating physician in the Hospital's emergency room, and for some time thereafter, was Dr. Roger Weir, a member of the neurology department. Tagoe remained hospitalized for a week and then recuperated at home for two weeks before returning to work on October 25, 2000. She did not complete her tour with the cardiothoracic unit but started her next assigned rotation in November and successfully completed the transitional residency program in June 2001 with an overall "satisfactory" rating. Although Tagoe received a contingent offer of a second-year residency at another institution, she did not pursue it. Instead, from October 2001 through July 2002, Tagoe worked for several months as a care manager and medical assistant at two assisted living facilities. Tagoe then entered a master's degree program in public health at the George Washington University, where she performed successfully. The record does not contain information on her subsequent professional progress.

As the ALJ found and the Hospital does not dispute, Tagoe's stroke was precipitated by the stress of her duties as a resident; in her cardiothoracic rotation, Tagoe reportedly had been working more than ninety hours a week and sleeping only a few hours a night. Tagoe did not inform her supervisors or the Hospital of the causal relationship between her work and her medical condition, however, until she filed a written notice of injury with the Office of Workers' Compensation on May 29, 2001. Tagoe claimed she had continuing migraine headaches resulting from her stroke that prevented her from completing her medical training, with a consequent loss of income. She sought payment of her medical expenses, disability benefits, and vocational rehabilitation payments to cover her tuition at George Washington University.

In addition to disputing Tagoe's claim on its merits,⁸ the Hospital argued that the claim was barred by Tagoe's failure to furnish written notice of her injury, including its alleged cause, within 30 days after she was or should have been aware of its relationship to her employment, as the Workers' Compensation Act requires.⁹ The purposes of this notification requirement are to enable the employer to investigate the facts surrounding the injury and to provide prompt medical attention.¹⁰ While the failure to give proper notice does not preclude a claim for causally related medical expenses (which may include the cost of vocational rehabilitation services),¹¹ it ordinarily does bar a claim for disability income benefits.¹² D.C.Code § 32-1513(d) provides, however, that failure to give proper notice shall not bar a compensation claim under two circumstances:

(1) If the employer (or his agent in charge of the business in the place where the injury occurred) ... had knowledge of the injury ... and its relationship to the employment and the Mayor determines that the employer ... has not been prejudiced by failure to give such notice; or

(2) If the Mayor excuses such failure on the ground that for some satisfactory reason such notice could not be given....[¹³]

In her initial compensation order, following an evidentiary hearing, the ALJ found that Tagoe's supervisors knew of her stroke from the outset, that Tagoe reasonably expected Dr. Weir to inform her supervisors of any connection between her injury and her work (though he did not do so), and that the Hospital was not prejudiced by Tagoe's failure to give timely written notice of her injury. Under those circumstances, the ALJ concluded, the exception set forth in subsection (d)(1) of D.C.Code § 32-1513 was satisfied and Tagoe's claim for compensation was not time-barred. The Director affirmed that ruling, emphasizing that Tagoe's injury "occurred on [her] Employer's premises and Employer's agents monitored her progress" as she recovered. The ALJ and the Director made no explicit findings, however, as to when Tagoe herself first knew or should have known that her stroke was work-related, or when the Hospital first had knowledge of that claimed relationship.

After the petitions for review came before us for oral argument, we determined that in order to decide whether Tagoe's failure to give timely written notice of her claim was properly excused pursuant to either of the exceptions in D.C.Code § 32-1513(d), it would be necessary to remand the record for an "authoritative interpretation"¹⁴ of the statute and for supplemental findings of fact.¹⁵ Our remand order posed two questions of statutory interpretation. First, we asked the Director to advise whether subsection (d)(1)'s requirement of employer "knowledge of the injury ... and its relationship to the employment" is satisfied if the employer merely knows the injury occurred in the course of employment, or whether the employer also must know the injury (at least allegedly) arose out of — i.e., was causally related to— the employment. Second, we asked the Director whether the knowledge requirement of subsection (d)(1) means the employer must have actual knowledge of the (alleged) relationship of the employee's injury to her employment, or is satisfied so long as the employer should have known (i.e., had constructive knowledge) of that relationship.¹⁶

Our order also identified the following three factual questions to be answered on remand:

(1) When was it that Tagoe became "aware or in the exercise of reasonable diligence should have been aware" of a causal relationship between her stroke and her employment, triggering her duty to furnish notice of her injury under D.C.Code § 32-1513(a)?

(2) When and how did the Hospital first have "knowledge" within the meaning of D.C.Code § 32-1513(d)(1) of a causal relationship between Tagoe's stroke and her employment?

(3) Did "some satisfactory reason" exist why timely notice of Tagoe's claim "could not be given" to the Hospital, within the meaning of D.C.Code § 32-1513(d)(2) (a statutory exception not addressed by the ALJ or the Director in their initial consideration of the claim)?

The questions of statutory interpretation were answered on remand in an opinion by the...