West Side Transport v. Cordell
| Decision Date | 13 October 1999 |
| Docket Number | No. 98-454.,98-454. |
| Parties | WEST SIDE TRANSPORT and Martin Boyer Co., Appellants, v. Phillip G. CORDELL, Appellee. |
| Court | Iowa Supreme Court |
Chris J. Sheldrup and Thomas D. Wolle of Moyer & Bergman, P.L.C., Cedar Rapids, for appellants.
Thomas M. Wertz of Wertz Law Firm, P.C., Cedar Rapids, for appellee.
Considered by CARTER, P.J., and LAVORATO, SNELL, CADY, and SCHULTZ,1 JJ.
West Side Transport and its insurer Martin Boyer Co. (collectively West Side) appeal from a district court judgment affirming an order in a workers' compensation proceeding that approved an injured employee's application for alternate medical care under Iowa Code section 85.27 (1997). We affirm.
Phillip G. Cordell is an over-the-road trucker. On January 15, 1997, he was injured in a motor vehicle accident during the course and scope of his employment with West Side. The accident happened in Hiawatha, Linn County, Iowa.
At all times material to this proceeding, Cordell was a resident of Enka Candler, North Carolina. The day following the accident—January 16—Cordell received medical treatment through his employer, West Side. Dr. Ray Miller treated Cordell on that date. Miller is an orthopedist and occupational medicine specialist at the Iowa Medical Clinic in Cedar Rapids. Miller diagnosed Cordell's injury as a thoracic-lumbar strain and recommended physical therapy. The doctor also recommended no work until Cordell's next appointment.
Cordell completed several days of therapy and again saw Miller on January 20. Miller told Cordell he could return to work the next day without any work restrictions. Miller also told Cordell that, if he did not significantly improve over the next week to ten days, he should return for further evaluation.
Following Miller's recommendation, Cordell went back to work. On April 15 Cordell returned to the clinic, complaining of continuing low back pain. Another doctor at the clinic, Dr. David R. Durand, saw Cordell. Durand indicated Cordell could work provided he lifted no more than fifteen pounds. Durand also recommended physical therapy. The doctor scheduled a follow-up appointment for April 18.
Cordell missed the April 18 appointment. Instead, he returned to his home in North Carolina where he sought treatment from a veterans hospital for symptoms associated with a compound fracture in his lower back. West Side did not authorize the treatment.
On June 16 Cordell filed with the Iowa Industrial Commissioner a petition for alternate medical care for a lumbar fracture and soft tissue injury. West Side denied liability for the fracture, claiming that Miller's records reflected no fracture at the time Miller examined and treated Cordell. Eventually, Cordell conceded that the fracture was not work related.
In July Dr. Todd Guthrie, an orthopedic specialist in North Carolina, examined Cordell and began treating him for low back pain related to the original injury Cordell suffered in January. Cordell asked his employer to authorize this treatment. West Side refused to authorize the treatment and instead insisted that Cordell travel to Cedar Rapids for further evaluation by the doctors at the Iowa Medical Clinic. This prompted Cordell to file a second petition for alternate care with the commissioner on August 12, asking for authorization for medical treatment near his home.
On August 12 the commissioner issued an order authorizing the deputy industrial commissioner, who would be presiding at the contested case hearing on the petition, to issue a final agency decision. See Iowa Code § 86.3. The order indicated there would be no right of intra-agency appeal on the decision. See id.
On August 29 the deputy held a hearing on the petition by telephone. The deputy continued the hearing to allow West Side to have Cordell examined by a doctor of its choice. Durand, one of the doctors who first treated Cordell, examined Cordell in Cedar Rapids. Durand recommended a short term of physical therapy. Following that examination, Guthrie—Cordell's doctor in North Carolina—examined Cordell and also recommended physical therapy.
On September 4 the alternate-care hearing resumed. West Side made clear at the hearing that it did not dispute Cordell's lower back injury was work related. The deputy made the following findings on the record:
It is found that defendant has refused to provide the care in a manner that is reasonable to treatment of this injury without undue [in]convenience to the claimant. First of all, they have not designated any physician since January or February, whenever he moved, to treat the individual at his place of residence. Claimant has sought then the care on his own from a Dr. Todd Guthrie, M.D. who is well qualified, board certified orthopedic according to his credentials that were submitted. And there is simply no reason to delay treatment of this matter any further.
In his conclusions of law, the deputy determined that West Side
The deputy ordered West Side to provide immediate care at its expense by Guthrie in North Carolina. West Side then filed a petition for judicial review in the district court, challenging the deputy's conclusion that it had lost the right to choose medical care for Cordell. The district court affirmed, and this appeal followed.
I. We summarized scope-of-review principles that apply to workers' compensation proceedings in Stephenson v. Furnas Electric Co.:
Our review of agency action under Iowa Code section 17A.19(8) is to determine whether our conclusions are the same as those of the district court. The district court, and we, accord only limited deference to the agency's interpretation of law, including statutory and agency rule interpretations. Our review of factual findings is greatly more circumscribed; we uphold the decision of the agency if it is supported by substantial evidence, when...
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