Merillat Industries, Inc. v. Parks, 921532

• Decision Date: 05 November 1993
• Docket Number: No. 921532,921532
• Citation: 436 S.E.2d 600,246 Va. 429
• Parties: , 16 O.S.H. Cas. (BNA) 1473 MERILLAT INDUSTRIES, INC., et al. v. Carter McKinnon PARKS. Record
• Court: Virginia Supreme Court

Page 600

436 S.E.2d 600

246 Va. 429, 16 O.S.H. Cas. (BNA) 1473

MERILLAT INDUSTRIES, INC., et al. v. Carter McKinnon PARKS.

Record No. 921532.

Supreme Court of Virginia.

Nov. 5, 1993.

John E. Kieffer (Woodward, Miles & Flannagan, on briefs), for appellants.

Ginger Jonas Largen (Gerald F. Sharp; Browning, Morefield, Lamie & Sharp, on brief), for appellee.

Present: CARRICO, C.J., and COMPTON, STEPHENSON, WHITING, LACY, and HASSELL, JJ., and HARRISON, Retired Justice.

LACY, Justice.

In this appeal we consider whether a torn rotator cuff muscle sustained by a worker because of repetitive motions in his assigned job is compensable under the Virginia Workers' Compensation Act, Title 65.1 (now 65.2) (the Act), as an occupational disease.

Carter McKinnon Parks was employed by Merillat Industries, Inc. to remove paint booth hangers from a rotating overhead conveyor. In 1989 Parks filed a claim with the Industrial Commission, now the Workers' Compensation Commission, to recover workers' compensation benefits for a tear to the rotator cuff muscle of his left arm. This tear resulted from repetitive overhead lifting and manipulation with his left arm required by his job. Merillat contended that Parks was not entitled to compensation benefits because the tear was a noncompensable cumulative traumatic injury.

Following a hearing, the Deputy Commissioner awarded Parks benefits under the Act, finding that the tear was compensable as an occupational disease. The full Commission affirmed the award, and the Court of Appeals upheld the decision of the Commission. Merillat Ind., Inc. v. Parks, 15 Va.App. 44, 53, 421 S.E.2d 867, 872 (1992). Finding that the case presents an issue of substantial precedential value, Code § 17-116.07(B), we awarded Merillat an appeal. We now reverse.

Identification of compensable injuries under the Act has been the subject of considerable judicial and legislative activity since the Act's adoption in 1918. Only accidental injuries related to employment were compensable until 1944 when "a carefully limited coverage for occupational diseases was added." Morris v. Morris, 238 Va. 578, 584, 385 S.E.2d 858, 862 (1989). Under either category, the claimant has the burden of showing that the injury or disease arose out of and in the course of the employment. Id.

Occupational diseases were addressed in Code § 65.1-46. ¹ That section provided:

As used in this Act, unless the context clearly indicates otherwise, the term "occupational disease" means a disease arising out of and in the course of employment, but not an ordinary disease of life to which the general public is exposed outside of the employment.

A disease shall be deemed to arise out of the employment only if there is apparent to the rational mind, upon consideration of all the circumstances:

(1) A direct causal connection between the conditions under which work is performed and the occupational disease,

(2) It can be seen to have followed as a natural incident of the work as a result of the exposure occasioned by the nature of the employment.

(3) It can be fairly traced to the employment as the proximate cause,

(4) It is neither a disease to which an employee may have had substantial exposure outside of the employment, nor any condition of the neck, back or spinal column,

(5) It is incidental to the character of the business and not independent of the relation of employer and employee, and

(6) It had its origin in a risk connected with the employment and flowed from that source as a natural consequence, though it need not have been foreseen or expected before its contraction.

The General Assembly uses the word disease repeatedly in this section. Occupational disease is defined as a "disease arising out of and in the course of employment." The six factors that establish the causal connection, and accordingly qualify a condition as an occupational disease, are described as factors by which a "disease shall be deemed to arise out of the employment." These factors are not applied to a condition, an ailment, or an impairment; they are applied to a disease. A plain reading of this section requires that the condition for which compensation is sought as an occupational disease must first qualify as a disease.

In this case, however, neither the Deputy Commissioner, the Commission, nor the Court of Appeals determined whether the tear to Parks's rotator cuff was a disease. Rather, they concluded the tear was a compensable "occupational disease" because Parks established a causal connection between the rotator cuff tear and the work place by applying the six factors listed in § 65.1-46. This "causality" analysis standing alone, however, does not comply with the requirements of the Act set out above for determining compensability of an impairment. Furthermore, applying this analysis, any ailment would be compensable as an occupational disease as long as it is shown to be causally connected to the work place by meeting the six factors set out in § 65.1-46. ²

We have declined previous invitations to broaden the scope of the Act to include job-related impairments arising from repetitive motion or cumulative trauma. We based our prior position, in part, on our conclusion that the categories of compensable injuries created by the legislature--accidental injury and occupational disease--are separate, meaningful categories. "A definition of either 'injury' or 'disease' that is so broad as to encompass any bodily ailment of...