Hearing Loss and Workers’ Compensation
Hearing loss is, by far, the most common occupational disease in the United States. Some sixty million Americans struggle with a significant degree of hearing loss, usually in both ears. This physical injury has emotional effects.
People who cannot follow conversations often stop socializing. The withdrawal from family, friends, and pleasant activities causes a deep depression, and usually anger as well. Raging Bull Jake LaMotta was mostly deaf in one ear, so he often went through uncontrollable anger fits.
If the hearing loss was work related, as outlined below, a Tampa workers’ compensation lawyer can obtain significant financial benefits. These benefits enable victims to get the treatment they need to restore their hearing. Furthermore, these benefits ease anxiety about paying monthly bills. There’s more good news. These benefits are usually available even if a victim was partially at fault, or entirely at fault, for the work-related injury.
Issues in Occupational Disease Cases
An occupational disease is a work-related injury that occurs over the course of more than one work shift. Many workplaces are noisy enough to cause permanent hearing loss, but not noisy enough to trigger mandatory safety controls. If employers aren’t forced to protect employee health and safety, they almost never do so.
For a Tampa workers’ compensation lawyer, hearing loss and other occupational disease claims present some special issues.
When victims break their arms, they immediately see doctors. But when victims cannot hear, they usually delay that doctor visit. As a result, their conditions deteriorate. Florida’s workers’ compensation system contributes to this problem. Most job injury victims must see company doctors. The team doctor normally gives a player a shot and a pep talk, then sends the player right back into the game without adequately treating the player’s injury.
Additionally, most people hear loud noises all day, every day, and not just at work. As a result, insurance companies often argue that the victim’s hearing loss was not work related. A lawyer must only prove that a non-work condition or environment contributed to the injury, as opposed to substantially causing it.
To draw this line, a Tampa workers’ compensation lawyer usually orders an independent medical examination. Most IME doctors charge nothing upfront for these services.
Benefits Available
The aforementioned job injury benefits usually include partial lost wage replacement and reasonable medical bill payment.
Normally, hearing loss is permanently disabling, at least partially. In these cases, the victim usually takes an RFC (residual functional capacity) test, to determine how much money the victim can earn going forward. The physical and emotional effects of hearing loss often sharply limit the ability to work.
Based on the results of that RFC test, the insurance company pays two-thirds of future lost wages, at least in most cases.
Medical bills are usually higher in occupational-related hearing loss cases, because of the aforementioned treatment delay. Many insurance companies don’t account for this delay and only pay the cost of a low-power hearing aid. A lawyer helps ensure that the insurance company pays all reasonably necessary medical bills, as opposed to all ideally necessary medical bills.
These medical bills usually include physician care, surgery (if needed), follow-up care, rehabilitation, and ancillary costs, such as medical devices and prescription drugs.
Connect With a Dedicated Hillsborough County Lawyer
Injury victims are entitled to important financial benefits. For a confidential consultation with an experienced workers’ compensation lawyer in Tampa, contact Kobal Law. We routinely handle matters throughout the Sunshine State.
Source:
ncoa.org/adviser/hearing-aids/hearing-loss-statistics/
