Lockheed Aircraft Corp. v. Marks

• Court: Georgia Court of Appeals
• Writing for the Court: SUTTON; FELTON; FELTON
• Citation: Lockheed Aircraft Corp. v. Marks, 88 Ga.App. 167, 76 S.E.2d 507 (Ga. App. 1953)
• Decision Date: 11 April 1953
• Docket Number: No. 34439,No. 1,34439,1
• Parties: LOCKHEED AIRCRAFT CORP. et al. v. MARKS

Page 507

76 S.E.2d 507

88 Ga.App. 167

LOCKHEED AIRCRAFT CORP. et al. v. MARKS.

No. 34439.

Court of Appeals of Georgia, Division No. 1.

April 11, 1953.

Rehearing Denied May 13, 1953.

Syllabus by the Court.

Where it was shown that an employee had fallen from a scaffold and fractured both heel bones in an accident in the course of and arising out of his employment, and that he had been continuously disabled for a period of six weeks from the time of his injury until he died of a vascular disease the finding of the Board of Workmen's Compensation, that the employee's death was the result of his accidental injury, was authorized, there being only opinion testimony to the contrary; and the judge of the superior court did not err in refusing to set aside the award of death benefits to the employee's widow, based on such finding, and in denying the defendants' appeal.

Gambrell, Harlan, Barwick, Russell & Smith, James C. Hill, Atlanta, for plaintiff in error.

Ben T. Beasley, Jr., Atlanta, for defendant in error.

SUTTON, Chief Judge.

Mrs. R. A. Marks applied to the State Board of Workmen's Compensation for a hearing of her claim for death benefits against Lockheed Aircraft Corporation and its insurance carrier, Pacific Indemnity Company, on account of the death of her husband, allegedly the result of an accidental injury arising out of and in the course of her husband's employment. Upon the hearing it was stipulated that R. A. Marks was employed by Lockheed on December 8, 1951, at an average weekly wage of $70; that he was on a scaffold in the Lockheed factory near Marietta, Georgia, on said date, when his tools started rolling back, and he had to jump from the scaffold; that he landed, fracturing both heel bones, and was disabled as a result of these fractures until the date of his death; and that the accident in which Marks' heel bones were fractured arose out of and in the course of his employment.

Mrs. R. A. Marks testified that she was living with her husband as his wife and sole dependent at the time of his death, and this testimony was undisputed.

The medical testimony was taken by deposition and submitted by the defendants. Dr. Joseph H. Boland testified substantially as follows: He is engaged in the practice of orthopedic surgery, and treated R. A. Marks in December, 1951, upon being called by the Medical Department of Lockheed Aircraft Corporation in Marietta. He had Marks sent to Crawford Long Hospital, where X-rays revealed comminuted depressed fractures of both oscalcis (heel bones). He had Marks' feet placed on pillows and packed in ice bags to lessen the pain and swelling that develops in such fractures. On December 9, the following day, with pentothal anaesthesia, he performed an open reduction on both feel and applied plaster casts. Marks was given penicillin, post-operative, for five days. The post-operative course was normal. Marks remained in the hospital twelve days; and then the casts were removed, the sutures were removed, and new casts were applied. Marks was discharged in a wheel chair. Dr. Boland did not hear from Marks until January 13, 1952, when Marks telephoned and said his left foot was very painful. The witness had Marks brought to his office by ambulance on that same day, a Sunday, and removed the cast from Marks' left foot. He saw no evidence of infection in the left foot and leg and no swelling. Marks' temperature was normal. Marks complained of severe pain in the toes of his foot but not in his heels. The witness prescribed empirin and codeine, and heard nothing more about Marks until January 16, 1952, when Mrs. Marks called him and said that another doctor had examined her husband, diagnosed the case as pneumonia and advised hospitalization. Dr. Boland would not authorize hospitalization at the defendants' expense on the ground that pneumonia could not be attributed to Marks' injury. At about 1 a. m. on January 17, an interne telephoned him from Grady Hospital and told him that Marks was there, had a temperature of 104, was delirious and showed no evidence of pneumonia, but that Marks had been diagnosed as having cellulitis of the foot with probably a pulmonary embolus. Dr. Boland had Marks transferred to Crawford Long Hospital, where he removed both casts and ordered penicillin. Marks was delirious, and it was necessary to give him a sedative. Marks' temperature was 104 degrees; and Dr. Boland suspected a pulmonary or cerebral hemorrhage. He saw Marks at 9 a. m. on January 17, and his condition was worse. Marks was placed in an oxygen tent, was under the care of special nurses, and was given transfusions. As there was no surgical condition in his line, Dr. Boland transferred Marks to the care of Dr. Henry, an internist. Marks died the next day, January 18, 1952.

Dr. Boland further testified: High temperature and delirium are symptoms of pulmonary or cerebral embolus, and it is possible that a cerebral embolus could have been caused by the immobilization of Marks' feet after the open reduction of the fractures. When he removed the cast from Marks' foot on January 13, he found a small area of irritation on the side of Marks' foot. He wiped it off and put a little dressing on it. When he next removed the cast early on January 17, there was no abscess nor swelling at this point, which he punctured with a needle to ascertain whether there was any infection.

'Q. Were you not informed before January 13th that the pain had been more or less continuous in Mr. Marks' leg? A. No, sir.

'Q. When were you first informed of that fact? Was it on that Sunday morning? A. On the 1oth of January; yes, sir.'

The witness could not account for the extreme pain until he heard from the autopsy. Marks was complaining of pain in his toes but not in his heels when he talked to Dr. Boland over the telephone, and when Marks was brought to Dr. Boland's office, his toes were so tender that one could hardly touch them. Marks' toes were not in any way involved in his previous injury. Any such injury causes swelling of the whole foot, but that had subsided when Marks left the hospital in December and before the casts were changed. He noticed no other swelling in Marks' legs after that time. The forming of blood clots in the areas of the fracture would normally be accompanied by swelling, but he never observed such swelling. The irritation on Marks' left foot was not tender, and was normal where an incision with a dressing upon it has been in a cast.

Dr. G. D. Ayes deposed substantially as follows: He is a pathologist, and, at 9 p. m. on January 18, 1952, two hours and ten minutes after Marks' death, he performed an autopsy to determine the cause of the death. After examining the microscopic sections or slides prepared from tissues removed at the time of the autopsy, he decided that Marks died from the effects of thrombocytic acroangiothrombosis. The chief symptoms of this disease are fever and vague pains throughout the body but mostly in the extremities. The classical terminal course is one with symptoms of involvement of the brain, such as stupor, somnolence, or sometimes by a degree of agitation, but finally somnolence and coma supervene. These symptoms are similar to those of other diseases, and may be produced by cerebral vascular accidents. Thrombocytic acroangiothrombosis attacks small arteries and the small vessels or capillaries immediately beyond the smallest arteries. The first change is a destruction of the wall of the vessel with a slight dilation. In the areas of dilation, thrombi form which occlude or stop up the opening of the vessels. This results in the virtual death of the affected organ. If any thrombi were formed in the arteries near the fractured heel bones, in order to reach the areas involved in Marks' death, they would have to go through progressively smaller vessels to the veins and by way of the veins to the right side of the heart, then through the progressively smaller vessels or the lungs to the left side of the heart, and from the left side of the heart to the arteries in which the lesions were found. Thrombi so formed in the arterial circulation near the heels could not go through the lungs and show up in arterial circulation leading to other vital organs without causing the patient's death on the way. The veins in Marks' body were dissected, but no venous thrombi were found, and he found no pulmonary embolus. If a part of a person's body is damaged by traumatic injury and immobilized, thrombi may be formed and would be formed if at all in the veins. To pass from the veins to the arteries, such thrombi would have to first pass through the lungs, unless there was a defect in the heart, a passage which would allow the blood to go from one side of the heart to the other without going through the lungs. No such passage was found in Marks' heart. If any thrombi or clots had formed as a result of the injury to Marks' heel bones, they could not have come from the arteries, and should any have escaped into the veins, they could not have gotten into the vessels of...