Virginia Court Says Injuries Occurring Two Years Apart Can Actually Be From the “Same Accident”

Construing Va. Code Ann. § 65.2-503(C), which provides for PTD benefits, rather than PPD benefits, when an individual suffers the loss of use of two limbs in the same accident, a Virginia appellate court held the state’s Workers’ Compensation Commission did not err when it affirmed a deputy commissioner’s award of PTD benefits to a claimant who sustained a serious work-related left arm and neck injury in 2009 and then, in 2011, sustained a serious knee injury when he became dizzy and fell as a result of pain medication he was taking in the aftermath of surgery to treat the 2009 injuries [Merck & Co. v. Vincent, 2020 Va. App. LEXIS 18 (Jan. 14, 2020)]. The Court stressed that claimant’s loss of use of the leg was properly considered to have arisen “in the same accident” since the knee injury was a consequential injury related to the earlier incident.

Employer’s Contentions

The employer contended the Commission should not have applied the special statute, that the claimant had sustained two separate “accidents” and not just one.

Compensable Consequence

The Court disagreed. Pointing to the “compensable consequence” doctrine, the Court noted that when the primary injury was shown to have arisen out of and in the course of employment, every natural consequence that flows from the injury likewise arises out of the employment, unless it is the result of an independent intervening cause attributable to claimant’s own intentional conduct. The Court noted that the employer had conceded that the claimant lost the use of two limbs within the meaning of the statute, and, therefore, the claimant was entitled to compensation for permanent total incapacity.