Successfully Defended Workers' Compensation Claim at Hardship Hearing in Missouri
Mar 01, 2016OUTCOME: Prevailed
In March of 2014, I successfully defended a workers’ compensation claim in Missouri for a major retail client. The claimant sustained a minor knee injury, but alleged that the injury necessitated a to ... tal knee replacement. The claimant obtained an expert who, at his deposition, testified that the claimant’s need for a total knee replacement was caused by the work injury, but acknowledged on cross examination that he had not viewed any diagnostic imaging to come to this conclusion. I obtained the opinion of the claimant’s treating physician as an expert, and, after viewing diagnostic imaging of the knee, he concluded that the claimant’s need for a total knee replacement preexisted the claimant’s work injury. At the hardship hearing, the Administrative Law Judge found the opinion of the employer’s expert more credible and found that the need for a total knee replacement was not caused by the work injury sustained by the claimant.
