Juhl v. Hussman-Ligonier Co.

• Decision Date: 19 December 1940
• Docket Number: No. 25694.,25694.
• Citation: 146 S.W.2d 106
• Parties: JUHL v. HUSSMAN-LIGONIER CO. et al.
• Court: Missouri Court of Appeals

146 S.W.2d 106

JUHL v. HUSSMAN-LIGONIER CO. et al.

No. 25694.

St. Louis Court of Appeals. Missouri.

December 19, 1940.

Rehearing Denied January 4, 1941.

Writ of Certiorari Granted February 1, 1941.

Appeal from St. Louis Circuit Court; James E. McLaughlin, Judge.

"Not to be reported in State Reports."

Proceeding under the Workmen's Compensation Act by Charles Juhl, claimant, opposed by the Hussman-Ligonier Company, employer, and the Liberty Mutual Insurance Company, insurance carrier, to recover compensation for an injury sustained by claimant. Judgment affirming an award of the Workmen's Compensation Commission denying compensation, and claimant appeals. On suggestion of the death of claimant, cause was revived in the name of Louisa Juhl, as widow and dependent of claimant.

Reversed and cause remanded with directions.

Hay & Flanagan, and Robert W. Herr, all of St. Louis, for appellant.

John F. Evans, of St. Louis, for respondent.

SUTTON, Commissioner.

This is an action under the Workmen's Compensation Law, commenced before the Workmen's Compensation Commission, on June 16, 1938, by Charles Juhl, to recover compensation for an accidental injury sustained by him on December 22, 1937, while in the employ of Hussman-Ligonier Company, insured by the Liberty Mutual Insurance Company. The commission denied compensation. Plaintiff appealed to the circuit court. From the judgment of the circuit court affirming the award of the commission, plaintiff has appealed here.

On suggestion of the death of the employee, Charles Juhl, the cause has been revived here in the name of Louisa Juhl as widow and dependent of the employee.

Plaintiff urges here that the circuit court erred in affirming the award of the commission, because there was no evidence in the record to warrant the commission in making such award.

The employee at the time of the accident was working at the plant of defendant Hussman-Ligonier Company in the City of St. Louis. He resided about a mile from the plant. The accident occurred about 7:35 in the morning. He walked from his home to the plant that morning. He had been in the employ of defendant Hussman-Ligonier Company for about two years. He had been laid off for a while in the fall. He returned to work for the company just a day or two before the occurrence of the accident. He was given a thorough medical examination before returning to work. The examination showed his condition satisfactory and he was given a slip allowing him to return to work. All employees who had been laid off were required to have a medical examination before returning to work.

Concerning the nature of his injury and the circumstances of the accident the employee testified, as follows:

"My first job in the morning was to go into the glue room where I worked, get an empty five-gallon paint bucket and fill it with water at the faucet in the factory about sixty feet from where I ordinarily worked. On this particular morning I got the empty bucket out of the glue room and went over to the faucet to fill it. I filled the bucket full, and as I picked up the bucket of water it seemed like it strained me like. I was shivering. I carried it about forty feet to the glue room and as I turned into the glue room it was like a knife stuck me in the pit of my stomach. I carried the bucket across the glue room to a heater, which was about twenty feet away, and by that time the pain had me doubled up, cramped up with pain right in the pit of the chest. The bucket weighed about forty-five pounds. It never before caused me any strain when I picked the bucket up, but that morning it did. It strained me to raise it up. I picked the bucket up and carried it about forty feet and all of a sudden I felt this piercing pain in my chest. I told my foreman I was sick, and I sat down on a pile of sacks, and was taken to the Christian Hospital. I stayed in the hospital for four days. The company doctor, Dr. Meinhardt was in charge of my case there. After being discharged from the hospital I was told by Dr. Meinhardt to go home and rest. On New Year's day I suffered a relapse and was sent to the City Hospital, where I stayed five weeks and was confined to bed during that period. I am now up and about and go to the City Hospital clinic every week or two for treatments. On November 17, 1938, I went back to the City Hospital and was confined to the hospital until December 6th. After my discharge I have remained in bed off and on. My present condition is such that I always have some slight pain in my chest, which sometimes becomes worse on changes in weather. The doctors will not allow me to take much exercise and I can only walk a block or two at a time. This has been my condition since the accident. Prior to that time my health was good. I am sixty-seven years old and have done carpenter work involving heavy manual labor during a great part of my life. I never had any attacks of this kind prior to the accident."

The record of the Christian Hospital as of December 22, 1937, shows employee complained of pain across chest and arms, over his xyphoid, and difficulty in breathing, condition coming on suddenly while working, past history essentially negative, and diagnosis, coronary occlusion.

Dr. E. Lee Shrader, who made an examination of the employee on March 1, 1939, testified, as follows: "At the time he complained of dyspnea and shortness of breath on exertion. Walking a few blocks would produce symptoms of heart consciousness, and he would frequently have to stop to get his breath. My examination showed a certain degree of arterio-sclerosis, and I concluded that he had suffered from a previous coronary occlusion which was the basis of his incapacity. A coronary occlusion is a complete closure of one of the arteries that supplies the heart muscle with blood. This occlusion is usually in the form of a blood clot."

Upon the facts shown in evidence as hypothesized and on his own knowledge derived from his examination of the employee and his knowledge and experience as a physician, he testified that in his opinion the lifting of the bucket of water and carrying it was a precipitating factor of the coronary occlusion. He further testified:

"Blood does not clot in a normal blood vessel. Some injury or some disease is necessary to cause blood to start to clot. In arterial diseases of old age we often have nutritional disturbances in the walls of the blood vessels. Coronary arteries are particularly susceptible of such changes. A roughening of the walls due to failure of nutrition, the laying down of calcium, fibrosis, and frequently even ulceration of the arterial walls may occur. Any one of these things may start a blood clot to form. Any blood clot when it first starts to form is not firmly attached to any structure. Any sudden exertion which may increase the blood pressure or increase the flow of blood through an artery in which the clot may be formed may dislodge the clot and may block the artery at a smaller point, that is, as the arteries move downward in the direction of the flow they become smaller in size and the clot could easily occlude a blood vessel. The occlusion in this case was caused by a clot. When a clot is forming inside an artery or blood vessel it forms along the side of the wall in the area of the diseased vessel. The increase in blood pressure alone without the resulting increased blood flow would probably not cause any particular trouble, but with the increased blood flow, that is, a greater amount of blood passing through the artery per unit of time at greater velocity might dislodge a soft poorly attached mass on the side of the wall of the artery. In my opinion that is what happened in this case. The lifting of the bucket of water would increase the flow of blood more than walking. If the bucket weighed one hundred pounds instead of forty-five pounds necessitating that extra exertion that likewise would have been a further increase in the flow of blood. In my opinion the strain of lifting a bucket of water loosened the blood clot and accounts for the occlusion. The lifting of the bucket caused the clot to close off the vessel."

Dr. Meinhardt, the employer's physician, who treated the employee while he was in the Christian Hospital, was not called as a witness.

Upon this evidence the commission found and ruled as follows: "We find from the evidence herein that the condition claimed by employee was neither caused nor aggravated by an accident arising out of and in the course of his employment on December 22, 1937, within the meaning of Section 3305(b) R.S. Missouri, 1929, Mo.St.Ann. § 3305(b), p. 8238, and of the Missouri Appellate Court decisions; that employee, at the time of said alleged accident, was not subjected to any unusual strain or exertion but was doing the usual and ordinary work incidental to his employment, and that the condition or disability of which he complains was the result of natural causes. Therefore, compensation herein must be and is hereby denied."

Our compensation law, section 3301, R.S. 1929, Mo.St.Ann. § 3301, p. 8232, provides that the employer shall be liable irrespective of negligence, to furnish compensation "for personal injury or death of the employe by accident arising out of and in the course of his employment." It will be observed that the statute fixes liability for injury or death by accident, not for injury or death resulting from accidental means.

Section 3305 provides that the word "accident" shall "be construed to mean an unexpected or unforeseen event happening suddenly and violently, with or without human fault and producing at the time objective symptoms of an injury," and that the term "injury" and "personal injuries" shall mean "only violence to the physical structure of the body and such disease or infection as naturally results therefrom," and that said terms shall not include occupational disease, nor any contagious or infectious disease, nor "death due to natural causes...