McDuffie v. Med. Ctr. Enter.

• Decision Date: 09 November 2012
• Docket Number: 2110696.
• Citation: 110 So.3d 857
• Parties: Nancy McDUFFIE v. MEDICAL CENTER ENTERPRISE.
• Court: Alabama Court of Civil Appeals

110 So.3d 857

Nancy McDUFFIE

v.MEDICAL CENTER ENTERPRISE.

2110696.

Court of Civil Appeals of Alabama.

Sept. 14, 2012.

Certiorari Denied Nov. 9, 2012

Alabama Supreme Court 1111657.

David W. Rousseau of Cobb, Boyd, White & Cobb, Dothan, for appellant.

Stephen D. Christie of Miller, Christie & Kinney, P.C., Vestavia Hills, for appellee.

THOMPSON, Presiding Judge.

On March 29, 2011, Nancy McDuffie filed a complaint seeking workers' compensation benefits from her employer, Medical Center Enterprise (“MCE”), for an injury she alleged she sustained on March 12, 2010, in the course of her employment. MCE filed an answer, but that answer is not contained in the record on appeal. MCE later moved for a summary judgment, arguing that McDuffie had failed to demonstrate that her injury arose out of and in the course of her employment. McDuffie opposed that summary-judgment motion.

On February 24, 2012, the trial court entered a summary judgment in favor of MCE. MCE filed a postjudgment motion in which it argued that the trial court's February 24, 2012, summary judgment did not comply with the requirements of § 25–5–88, Ala.Code 1975. Thereafter, on March 15, 2012, the trial court entered an amended judgment detailing the undisputed facts and its legal conclusions based on those facts. McDuffie timely appealed.

The relevant facts are undisputed. The testimony from McDuffie's deposition indicates that she has been employed as a patient-care attendant, or PCA, for MCE since November 2009. The record indicates that a PCA assists nurses in performing their job duties.

Also in 2009, McDuffie began attending Enterprise Community College to earn her registered-nurse (“RN”) degree. In January 2010, McDuffie was admitted into the nursing program at Wallace Community College (“Wallace”). As part of Wallace's program, McDuffie was to attend classes and participate in “clinicals” in which she and other nursing students worked, under the supervision of a Wallace instructor, in the hospital from 7:00 a.m. until 12:00 p.m. The record does not indicate how frequently those clinicals were conducted. McDuffie explained that Wallace allowed its students to select from three area hospitals in which to perform their clinicals and that she chose MCE because it was convenient for her to perform clinicals at the same place at which she was employed. It is undisputed that MCE had not provided benefits to pay for McDuffie's schooling to become an RN and that the clinicals were not connected to McDuffie's employment at MCE.

McDuffie testified that on March 12, 2010, she was to attend her fourth or fifth day of clinicals. McDuffie worked the night shift at MCE from 7:00 p.m. on March 11, 2010, until 7:00 a.m. on March 12, 2010. McDuffie testified that shortly before 7:00 a.m. on the morning of March 12, 2010, she changed from the “scrubs” she was required to wear for her job with MCE into the nursing “whites” that Wallace requires its nursing students to wear while performing clinicals in a hospital. According to McDuffie, after she changed into her whites, she clocked out at 7:01 a.m. and said goodbye to a supervisor. McDuffie acknowledged that, at that point, she had no further job duties to perform as a PCA for MCE.

McDuffie testified that, after she clocked out, she proceeded to the MCE lobby to meet her clinical supervisor and the other nursing students taking part in clinicals that day. McDuffie agreed that the supervisor and several other Wallace students were present in the MCE lobby and were waiting to start clinicals when she arrived. McDuffie stated that, as she reached the lobby, she realized that she had left a folder that contained materials she needed for clinicals in her vehicle. McDuffie testified that “I did speak to Dr. Kelley [ (the clinicals supervisor) ] and [told] her I forgot my folder in my car, and she told me to go get it.”

In support of its summary-judgment motion, MCE also submitted the affidavit of Sabrina Kelley, the clinicals supervisor for Wallace. Kelley testified, among other things, that:

“When Ms. McDuffie reported to the lobby at [MCE] shortly after 7:00 a.m. on the morning of March 12, 2010, she immediately informed me that she had forgotten her notebook, which was in her car. I agreed to delay the start of clinicals for her to go to her car and retrieve the notebook....”

It is undisputed that, after McDuffie left the lobby to go to her vehicle, she fell on some stairs in the hallway leading to the parking lot where her vehicle was located. McDuffie is not certain what caused her fall, and she stated she might have tripped on a stair or on an anti-slip strip in the hallway. McDuffie broke her arm in that fall.

Before the trial court, McDuffie sought workers' compensation benefits under the theory that she had fallen while leaving her employer's place of business. MCE argued that McDuffie's injury arose during the course of her college clinicals and was not connected to her employment. In reaching its March 15, 2012, judgment in favor of MCE, the trial court determined that McDuffie failed to demonstrate that the injury arose out of and in the course of her employment. In addition, the trial court concluded that McDuffie had failed to present evidence indicating that her fall was caused by a condition of her employment.

With regard to the standard for reviewing a summary judgment, this court has stated:

“ ‘We review a summary judgment de novo, applying the same standard as was applied in the trial court. A motion for a summary judgment is to be granted when no genuine issue of material fact exists and the moving party is entitled to a judgment as a matter of law. Rule 56(c)(3), Ala. R. Civ. P. A party moving for a summary judgment must make a prima facie showing “that there is no genuine issue as to any material fact and that the moving party is entitled to a judgment as a matter of law.” Rule 56(c)(3), Ala. R. Civ. P. The court must view the evidence in a light most favorable to the nonmoving party and must resolve all reasonable doubts against the movant. Hanners v. Balfour Guthrie, Inc., 564 So.2d 412 (Ala.1990). If the movant meets this burden, “the burden then shifts to the nonmovant to rebut the movant's prima facie showing by ‘substantial evidence.’ ” Lee v. City of Gadsden, 592 So.2d 1036, 1038 (Ala.1992).' ”

Barrett v. Lee Brass Co., 883 So.2d 227, 228 (Ala.Civ.App.2003) (quoting Bailey v. R.E. Garrison Trucking Co., 834 So.2d 122, 123 (Ala.Civ.App.2002)).

McDuffie argues that the trial court erred in entering a summary judgment in favor of MCE. Specifically, she contends that an injury that occurs on the employer's premises as the employee is leaving work can be compensable under the Workers' Compensation Act (“the Act”), § 25–5–1 et seq., Ala.Code 1975. An injury is compensable under the Act if the accident that caused the injury arose out of and in the course of employment. § 25–5–31, Ala.Code 1975. Our supreme court has held that “[a]n injury to an employee arises in the course of his employment when it occurs within the period of his employment, at a place where he may reasonably be and while he is reasonably fulfilling the duties of his employment or engaged in doing something incident to it.” Massey v. United States Steel Corp., 264 Ala. 227, 230, 86 So.2d 375, 378 (1955).

McDuffie maintains that the injury occurred on MCE's premises as she was leaving work and, therefore, that her injury is compensable. In support of her argument, McDuffie cites Massey, supra, and Brunson v. Lucas, 5 So.3d 1274 (Ala.Civ.App.2008). In Massey, supra, the evidence indicated that, after he completed his work shift, Massey walked quickly across the employer's premises to take a cold shower in a facility owned by the employer; Massey suffered an aneurysm as he was exiting the shower. The court determined that “[t]he use of the unheated water after a rapid walk on a warm day increased the employee's blood pressure and caused the diseased or weakened blood vessel wall to break,” causing the aneurysm. Massey, 264 Ala. at 229, 86 So.2d at 377. The trial court found that the aneurysm was caused by Massey's employment but that it did not arise out of the employment, and it entered a judgment in favor of the employer. Our supreme court agreed that the employment caused the accident, but it reversed that part of the trial court's judgment denying workers' compensation benefits. Our supreme court determined that Massey was entitled to benefits because the aneurysm arose out of his employment. The court explained that Massey was entitled to benefits because, when he was injured, he was “an employee, while in the act of leaving his employer's premises, where his service has been performed, at an appropriate time after the completion of his actual service, [who was] engaged in an act naturally related and incidental to the service or work which he was engaged to perform.” Massey, 264 Ala. at 232, 86 So.2d at 380.

In Brunson, supra, the plaintiff worker was injured when, as he was crossing a street to the employer's parking lot, he was struck by a co-employee's vehicle. This court held that, because he had sought workers' compensation benefits from his employer, the injured worker could not maintain an action against a co-employee absent an allegation of willful conduct on the part of the co-employee. In reaching its holding on that issue, this court noted that, “[i]n general, an employeeis not entitled to workers' compensation benefits for an injury sustained while traveling to and from his or her place of employment; however, one exception to that rule permits an employee to recover compensation benefits if he or she is injured while in a parking lot owned and maintained by his or her employer.” Brunson v. Lucas, 5 So.3d at 1277.

Our supreme court has explained other exceptions allowing the recovery of workers' compensation benefits when an employee is traveling to or from work:

“Generally, Alabama law has held...