Little v. Penn Ventilator Co.

• Decision Date: 02 July 1986
• Docket Number: No. 398PA85,398PA85
• Citation: 345 S.E.2d 204,317 N.C. 206
• Court: North Carolina Supreme Court
• Parties: Kenneth LITTLE, Employee, Plaintiff v. PENN VENTILATOR COMPANY, Employer; and Home Insurance Company, Carrier, Defendants.

Page 204

345 S.E.2d 204

317 N.C. 206

Kenneth LITTLE, Employee, Plaintiff v. PENN VENTILATOR COMPANY, Employer and Home Insurance Company, Carrier, Defendants.

No. 398PA85.

Supreme Court of North Carolina.

July 2, 1986.

Ralph G. Jorgensen, Tabor City, for plaintiff-appellant.

Hedrick, Eatman, Gardner & Kincheloe by William J. Garrity and Edward L. Eatman, Charlotte, for defendants-appellees.

EXUM, Justice.

Plaintiff seeks workers' compensation for an injury to his left eye. A deputy commissioner of the Industrial Commission awarded plaintiff $2500 under N.C.G.S. § 97-31(24) for permanent eye injury and medical expenses incurred as a result of the injury until plaintiff reached maximum improvement. The deputy commissioner denied any future medical expenses after plaintiff reached maximum medical improvement concluding: "There is no provision in the Workers' Compensation Act for periodic medical examinations unless they are determined to be necessary to lessen the plaintiff's disability." Both plaintiff and defendants appealed to the Full Commission. Plaintiff contended $2500 was not adequate compensation for permanent injury to his eye and defendants contended N.C.G.S. § 97-31(24) does not entitle plaintiff to any compensation. The Full Commission affirmed the $2500 award but modified that portion relative to medical expenses as follows:

[I]t appears from a reading of the record that plaintiff will need monitoring of his medical condition in the future by his physicians so as to tend to lessen his period of disability. The portion of the decision relating to medical expenses shall be amended and revised to provide that the defendants shall continue to pay medical expenses incident to plaintiff's injury so long as his physician deems it necessary to lessen the period of disability. The Full Commission adopts as its own the Opinion and Award of the Hearing Commissioner as herein amended.

Both parties brought before the Court of Appeals the same contentions they argued to the Industrial Commission. In addition, defendants argued the Commission's award of future medical expenses was improper because plaintiff had no period of disability resulting from his injury which future medical treatments could lessen. The Court of Appeals struck that aspect of the Commission's award pertaining to future medical expenses, saying:

'Disability' is defined under the applicable law as 'incapacity because of injury to earn the wages which the employee was receiving at the time of injury in the same or any other employment.' G.S. 97-2(9). See Watkins v. Central Motor Lines, 279 N.C. 132, 181 S.E.2d 588 (1971). G.S. 97-25 entitles plaintiff to reimbursement of such medical expenses as will tend to 'lessen [his] period of disability.' The record before us reveals no evidence of continuing disability as that term is defined in the Worker's Compensation Act. In fact the evidence in this case shows affirmatively that plaintiff had returned to work after five weeks and was earning more than before his injury.

Little v. Ventilator Co., 75 N.C.App. at 97-98, 330 S.E.2d at 279. The questions presented are whether: (1) plaintiff is entitled to future medical expenses under N.C.G.S. § 97-25 even though they will not lessen the period of disability; (2) N.C.G.S. § 97-31(24) authorizes compensation for plaintiff's eye injury; and (3) if it does, whether $2500 is proper and equitable compensation. We answer them all affirmatively.

I.

Evidence in the record tends to show the following: While operating a rivet machine in the employment of Penn Ventilator Company, plaintiff was struck in the left eye by a flying sliver of metal. Plaintiff's physician Dr. J.K. Chambers, elected not to remove the metal; instead, he performed laser surgery to seal the site where it entered plaintiff's eye.

After plaintiff's release from the hospital, he returned to work for defendant, Penn Ventilator Company, and at the time of the hearing below was earning wages at a higher rate than before he was injured. Plaintiff testified the injury had no adverse effect on his ability to perform his job.

Although vision in plaintiff's eye remains normal, plaintiff's injury poses a constant threat of future complications, including loss of vision. The metal embedded in his eye may rust or cause retinal detachment. Upon evidence of the happening of either event, surgery will be necessary. Because of the threat to plaintiff's eyesight posed by these potential complications, plaintiff's eye requires close medical supervision including at a minimum periodic check-ups and yearly electroretinograms, a test for recording changes in the retina.

With this evidence before it, the Commission, adopting the findings of the hearing commissioner, made findings and conclusions of law as follows:

1. On March 28, 1980, plaintiff was operating a rivet machine when it malfunctioned and a piece of metal hit plaintiff in his left eye. Plaintiff sustained an injury by accident arising out of and in the course of his employment with defendant-employer.

2. Plaintiff was hospitalized and treated for a laceration of his cornea and as a result of that treatment the piece of metal was left in his eye and the laceration was closed around it. As a result, plaintiff has a visible scar tract through the vitreous gel body of his left eye which presents a clear danger for retinal detachment in the future. Plaintiff has a scar in the retina surrounding the encysted foreign body. This type of injury results in a significantly increased occurrence of retinal detachment when compared with the incidence in normal, uninjured eyes.

3. As a result of the injury herein, plaintiff has suffered permanent injury to an important part of his body, i.e., his left eye, for which no compensation is payable under any other subdivision of this section. Plaintiff has not suffered any loss of vision as a result of this injury at this time.

....

5. As a result of the injury herein plaintiff will require periodic check-ups to make sure there is no loss of vision or rusting of the metallic body left in his eye or evidence of retinal detachment....

Defendants owe to plaintiff $2,500.00 for permanent injury to his eye. G.S. 97-31(24).

Upon the foregoing findings of facts and conclusions of law the Commission entered an award of $2500 less $350 for attorney's fees for the eye injury and directed payment of further medical expenses as hereinabove set out.

II.

Plaintiff contends the Court of Appeals erred in striking his award for future medical expenses. We agree with the Court of Appeals that future medical treatment will not lessen the period of plaintiff's disability because plaintiff's injury has not resulted in a period of disability beyond the healing period. Where as in this case there is no reduction in earning ability, there is no period of disability to be lessened. N.C.G.S. § 97-25 does not, however, limit an employer's obligation to pay future medical expenses to those cases in which such expenses will lessen the period of disability. The statute also requires employers to pay the expenses of future medical treatments even if they will not lessen the period of disability as long as they are reasonably required to (1) effect a cure or (2) give relief.

Before 1973 an employer was not obligated to pay the expenses of medical treatment given more than ten weeks after the date of injury unless the additional treatment would tend to lessen the period of disability. N.C.G.S. § 97-25 then provided:

Medical, surgical, hospital, nursing services, medicines, sick travel, and other treatment including medical and surgical supplies as may reasonably be required, for a period not exceeding ten weeks from date of injury to effect a cure or give relief and for such additional time as in the judgment of the Commission will tend to lessen the period of disability, ... shall be provided by the employer.

(Emphasis added.) See Peeler v. Highway Comm'n, 302 N.C. 183, 186, 273 S.E.2d 705, 707 (1981). The ten-week limitation had the practical effect of making all awards for the expenses of future medical treatment contingent upon a claimant's showing that such treatment is required to lessen the period of disability.

In 1973 the legislature amended N.C.G.S. § 97-25 by deleting the ten-week limitation with respect to medical treatments required to effect a cure or give relief. 1973 N.C.Sess.Laws ch. 520, § 1(b). It is this version of the statute which governs this case, and it provides:

Medical, surgical, hospital, nursing services, medicines, sick travel, rehabilitation services, and other treatment including medical and surgical supplies as may reasonably be required to effect a cure or give relief and for such additional time as in the judgment of the commission will tend to lessen the period of disability, ... shall be provided by the employer.

N.C.G.S. § 97-25. The legislature's obvious intent was to compel employers to provide medical treatments reasonably required to "effect a cure or give relief" more than ten weeks after the date of injury. As a result of the 1973 amendment N.C.G.S. § 97-25 contains three grounds upon which an employer must provide future medical expenses where before 1973 it contained only one. In addition to the traditional duty to provide treatments required to lessen the period of disability, the employer also must provide treatments to effect a cure or give relief.

If awarding of expenses for medical treatment were construed to be dependent upon a claimant's showing that further treatment would lessen disability, many victims of scheduled injuries would be left without compensation. Claimants with scheduled injuries often are unable to demonstrate their injuries resulted in any decrease in earning ability. In those cases, as in the case before us, where claimants have no earning disability, no amount of medical treatment will lessen their disability. Even under the law as it existed...