Does Workers’ Compensation Cover Long-Term Problems or Illnesses?

Hello I am here to answer another frequently asked question about workers’ compensation. A quick introduction before I begin, I am a Work Injury attorney and have 43 Years of Experience helping injured workers’ through the hard times they face because of their work injury. With that said, lets continue to the question.

The Question

The question opposed is about CT claims or better known as Cumulative or Continuous Trauma Claims, that is what the CT stands for.

“Does Workers’ Compensation Cover Long-Term Problems or Illnesses?”. This is a hot topic frankly here in 2018 California. The insurance industry and the employers lobby is pushing hard against this concept. The truth is that only a hand full of states still recognize CT Claims and California is one of them.

CT Claims

CT Claims are typically what you consider toxic exposure or wear and tare kind of claims. Toxic exposure is like poor ventilation or exposure to chemicals over a protractive period of time at your job that eventually leaves to some type of disability or impairment.

Static Posturing Injury

The cumulative trauma that is more typical is repetitive motion injuries or posture injuries. Static Posturing is like when a person is sitting on a desk fixed on a computer screen for a long period of time, if you are doing that day in day out for 8 hours a day you can eventually develop neck injuries, upper extremity injuries, shoulder injuries, back injuries, etc. That is what you call static posturing injury.

Repetitive Motion Injury

The cousin of that kind of injury is Repetitive Motion injury which is a keyboard work type of injury or working on an assembly line, basically some place where you are doing the same thing over and over again. This could be using either your legs, arms, shoulders, etc. This leads to a wear and tear kind of injury. These are things that accumulate over time and is why they are called cumulative trauma, they build up over time.

Pacman Analogy

I frequently use the analogy of a Pacman. The Pacman is just eating at your capacity to do work. A little bit at a time you go to work until eventually you hit a wall and now you got some pain or symptoms and you need to see a doctor and need to get treatment and possible time off from work. That is a CT claim, they are long-term development claims. They don’t happen over night, they take a long time to develop.

If you find yourself in the situation where you are dealing with a CT Claim, we would be happy to answer any questions you may have. Feel free to contact us for a free case evaluation.

NOTICE: Making a false or fraudulent Workers Compensation claim is a felony subject to up to 5 years in prison or a fine of up to $50,000 or double the value of the fraud, whichever is greater, or by both imprisonment and fine.