Smith v. Cook Paint & Varnish Co., KCD

• Decision Date: 30 January 1978
• Docket Number: No. KCD,KCD
• Citation: Smith v. Cook Paint & Varnish Co., 561 S.W.2d 730 (Mo. App. 1978)
• Parties: Guy Daniel SMITH, Appellant, v. COOK PAINT & VARNISH CO. and the Travelers Insurance Company, Respondents. 29045.
• Court: Missouri Court of Appeals

Page 730

561 S.W.2d 730

Guy Daniel SMITH, Appellant, v.COOK PAINT & VARNISH CO. and the Travelers Insurance Company, Respondents.

No. KCD 29045.

Missouri Court of Appeals, Kansas City District.

Jan. 30, 1978.

Thomas M. Howell, Kansas City, Elwyn L. Cady, Jr., Independence, for appellant.

Gary E. Lowe, Jack B. Robertson, Rogers, Field, Gentry, Benjamin & Robertson, Kansas City, for respondents.

Before SHANGLER, P. J., and WELBORN and HIGGINS, Special Judges.

SHANGLER, Presiding Judge.

The employee Smith made claim against employer Cook Paint and Varnish Company for accidental injury to the eye and other bodily functions from exposure to anhydride chemicals.The Industrial Commission denied benefits, the circuit court affirmed, and the claimant appeals.

At the time of the event, the employee was a foreman and had worked in the resin manufacture department for more than twenty-five years.The product was made from a process in which phthalic and maleic anhydrides in solid form were liquefied and pumped at high temperature under pressure through a system of pipes to kettles to be cooked.

In the early morning of January second, one of the pumps in the phthalic anhydride system malfunctioned from leakage of the chemical which solidified around the pump.It was a recurrent phenomenon which the claimant had confronted many times before.The pump was located in a tunnel in the basement.The claimant entered the tunnel to free the machine but was enveloped in clouds of phthalic crystals and so had to remove the face mask he wore in order to proceed with his work.After an effort of about twenty minutes, the claimant withdrew from the tunnel, but then returned for another five minutes to conclude the task.An hour later he became nauseated and developed chest pains.Then, during the week he began to develop pains in the thighs and calves of his legs.

The claimant assumed his trouble was arthritis and sought medical treatment for that malady.He was treated for that condition by medication first by one doctor and then another.His leg complaints did not abate, so the claimant was admitted to the Veterans Hospital where he remained from February 26th until March 7th.A biopsy of the calf muscle diagnosed his condition as polymyositis.During that internment he experienced an occasional loss of vision in the left eye.On May 14th, after the claimant had returned to work, and while on a regular shift he suddenly and painlessly lost the sight of his right eye.He consulted Dr. Deligeorges who diagnosed the condition as a central retinal occlusion.

The main issue before the Industrial Commission was whether the exposure to either or both of the anhydrides phthalic or maleic was a cause of the central retinal occlusion.It was the theory of the claimant that the exposure to these chemical fumes was an accident which aggravated a preexistent collagen disease (malady of the connective tissue) and resulted in the central retinal occlusion in his right eye.

The first point on appeal contends that the Industrial Commission applied an erroneous standard of causation to deny compensation.This contention focuses upon one finding by the referee adopted by the Industrial Commission:

I have been unable to find the necessary convincing evidence that the two chemical substances known as phthalic anhydride . . . and maleic anhydride . . . were the medically competent producing cause of the injuries sustained by the Claimant solely as a result of the exposure on the second day of January, 1970.

The claimant contends that this finding discloses the referee (and the Commission) found only that the exposure to the chemicals was not the sole cause of his blindness but failed to consider whether or not, in concurrence with the pre-existent collagen disease, it was a contributing cause of the injury.

The law compensates industrial injury which follows as a legitimate consequence of an accident.An accident need not be the sole or direct cause of injury to be compensable; it is enough that the accident be "an efficient, exciting, superinducing, concurring or contributing cause."Manley v. American Packing Co., 363 Mo. 744, 253 S.W.2d 165, 169(3)(Mo.1952).Thus, it is immaterial to recovery that a particular disability was not expected from an accident or cannot be directly traceable to that event.It is enough if the accident produced the final injury.Inquiry as to whether the result was natural or probable does not properly arise.Fielder v. Production Credit Association, 429 S.W.2d 307, 316(16, 17)(Mo.App.1968).This legal conclusion of cause and effect, of course, ordinarily depends upon evidence of medical cause given by physician witnesses, and on this claimant bears the burden of proof.Griggs v. A. B. Chance Company, 503 S.W.2d 697, 704(6)(Mo.App.1974).

The findings of the Commission on the evidence...