Transport Indemnity Co. v. Industrial Accident Commission

WOOD (Fred B.), J.

The employer's insurance carrier claims the evidence does not support the respondent commission’s finding that the employee’s injury resulted in temporary total disability. The

The employee, a truck driver, sustained an injury to Ms lower back on May 10, 1956, when attempting to lift the tailgate of his truck preparatory to picking up a load of gravel. He had been hauling sacks of cement with the tailgate down.

He received compensation and medical treatment until November, in December, 1956, applied to the commission for adjustment of his claim. At the hearing in March, 1957, he testified that he had not returned to work yet. He was put first into a cast, then into a truss belt for a while and then into a chairbaek brace which he was still wearing pursuant to Dr. Jaskiewicz’s instructions. The doctor told him he could return to light duty, that he could drive a truck. He went went

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and drove with a friend of his three or four times (the last time was in December) but each time he rode on the truck he would get a backache and quite a bit of discomfort. After two to three hours he would have to get out of the truck in order to get comfort.

He had béen trying to locate other jobs but had not been able to find them as yet. He went to his employer, Pacific Coast Aggregates, to see if he could get a job when released for light work but they would not put him back to work at light work because they did not have it. Asked if there is no work available right now, he said “right now there happens to be 350 men sitting in the union hall.”

He felt he could perform a little more than light work but not that he could go back and lift those hundred pounds bags of cement all day, the kind of work he was doing when the injury occurred. He was unable to bend over to the floor to pick up the sacks. Due to the pain at the belt line and the catch in the back he was unable to bend clear over.

He said he felt he could drive a dump truck now; dump truck work is light when one is hauling nothing but gravels or fills.

There was medical testimony that he could now do light work. On September 17, 1956, Dr. Jaskiewicz was of the opinion that the employee could perform “light work” commencing September 1 and “regular work” commencing October 1. October 31 this doctor reported that the employee’s return to work was delayed because of a recent accident (nonindustrial in origin) but that he was then “available for light work.” On November 29 Dr. Jaskiewicz reported that the employee was “able to return to his regular work,” but the doctor expressed the desire that the employee be examined by another orthopedist because he “would rather have another opinion before such determination is made.” Accordingly, Dr. Eisenberg examined the employee on January 7, 1957. He expressed the opinion that the employee could do a “very light type of work, if such were available.” Dr. Walker made an examination on January 4 and reported that the employee “could be gainfully employed” but should not “undertake any type of heavy work which would involve excessive stooping, bending or lifting of objects over 75 pounds in weight.”