What the panel ordered
Decision After Reconsideration issued September 15, 2021, affirming the WCJ's Findings of Fact and Award dated October 9, 2020, denying the Petition for Reconsideration and upholding the permanent disability rating and apportionment.
Petition for Reconsideration filed by applicant contesting Findings of Fact and Award dated October 9, 2020, specifically permanent disability rating and apportionment; WCJ Report and Recommendation to deny petition adopted by Board as Decision After Reconsideration.
What was disputed, and how it came out
Each issue the panel decided, with the reasoning it gave. An outcome is what this panel did on this record — not a rule, and not a prediction.
The Board affirmed the WCJ's finding that the vocational expert's report was not substantial evidence to rebut the permanent disability rating schedule or the AME's apportionment, due to incomplete employment history and failure to address non-industrial factors, thus upholding the 24% permanent disability rating after apportionment.
From the decision · page 1applicant seeks reconsideration of the Findings of Fact and Award, served October 9, 2020, wherein the workers' compensation administrative law judge (WCJ) found applicant sustained an industrial cumulative trauma injury over the period May 24, 2009 through September 8, 2020, to his neck (cervical spine), bilateral shoulders, bilateral elbows, bilateral wrists, bilateral thumbs, and bilateral knees, but not to his psyche, while employed as a maintenance technician by Warmel Company dba McDonalds. The WCJ found applicant did not rebut the permanent disability rating, and relied on the impairment rating of Dr. Jackson, the Agreed Medical Examiner (AME), to rate applicant's permanent disability. The WCJ found applicant was entitled to an award of 104 weeks of temporary disability, and permanent partial disability of 24%, after apportionment.