Ray v. Wells-Lamont Glove Factory, WELLS-LAMONT

• Decision Date: 09 March 1959
• Docket Number: No. 41066,WELLS-LAMONT,41066
• Citation: 109 So.2d 544,236 Miss. 154
• Parties: Mrs. Lois RAY v.GLOVE FACTORY et al.
• Court: Mississippi Supreme Court

Page 544

109 So.2d 544

236 Miss. 154

Mrs. Lois RAY v. WELLS-LAMONT GLOVE FACTORY et al.

No. 41066.

Supreme Court of Mississippi.

March 9, 1959.

Laurel G. Weir, Philadelphia, for appellant.

Snow, Covington & Shows, Meridian, for appellee.

McGEHEE, Chief Justice.

This is a claim for compensation on account of a hernia, and is made under the Workmen's Compensation Act. The attorney-referee denied the claim, and the full commission affirmed the decision, and on an appeal to the circuit court the decision of the full commission, which in this case was unanimous, was affirmed by the circuit court. This appeal is taken from that judgment.

During the month of May 1955 the claimant received an injury while at work for the appellee Wells-Lamont Glove Factory, which arose out of and in the course of her employment. The injury was a hernia in an old abdominal incision line where she had undergone sometime prior thereto a cesarean section. This hernia was repaired on May 26, 1955, by Dr. R. G. Hand of Philadelphia, Mississippi, who testified in the instant case that the former condition of the claimant was a post-surgical or post-operation hernia. The claimant was paid compensation by her employer for the period from May 24, 1955, to July 25, 1955 for temporary total disability in the sum of $197.55, and in addition, hospital and medical expenses in the total sum of $250, making a grand total of $447.55.

On February 10, 1958, the claimant signed a written statement for a representative of the insurance carrier which recited among other things that 'in May of 1955 I had a hernia repair as a result of a box of gloves falling and the corner of the box striking me in the pit of the stomach. Dr. Hand did the repair and I went back to work the last of July. The repair held all right until sometime in September 1955. At that time I picked up a box of gloves. I do not know how much the box weighs but it holds ten dozen pairs of gloves. They were in a wooden box. The pain was very severe, burning and stinging. I reported it at the time to my supervisor, Mavis Tullos, she said I should see the doctor. I saw Dr. Hand. I saw him occasionally from that time until January 29, 1958. He advised me against another repair. I then talked with Dr. Caffey, who thought I needed a repair. He referred me to Dr. Bill Thornton in Meridian. There has been a gradual getting worse since September 1955, but no specific traumatic injuries since that time. The hernia was repaired again on February 4, 1958, and I am still unable to return to work. I worked on the basis of a forty hour week at a little over a dollar per hour. My job was sitting down at a sewing machine and when a box of gloves was completed we have to move them out of the way. We had to lift them to a stool about a foot high. I have read this report and it is correct to the best of my knowledge. (Signed) Lois Ray.'

Dr. Hand testified that after the operation in May 1955 for the post surgical or post-operation hernia, he did not see the claimant again until December 15, 1955. But she claims that she sustained her second injury while at work on April 12, 1956, and that she saw Dr. Hand the next day. The doctor's records disclose that he did see the claimant on April 13, 1956, but do not disclose that she said anything to him about having sustained an injury on the previous day, but her statements to him, as shown by his records, indicate that she had...