Honoring injured New York workers on Memorial Day 2010

Today is Memorial Day, when across the country Americans gather to remember and pay tribute to those who have risked or lost their lives to defend this great nation.  Sadly, many hard-working, hard-fighting veterans come home safely, only to later be injured or killed in an on-the-job accident in New York.

After spending time in the military defending the United States, many men and women return home and take up non-military related jobs.  Some of these jobs can be dangerous, but most are just ordinary jobs intended to provide a fair and happy life for the military veteran and their family.  Some veterans take jobs as firefighters, police, or other emergency workers, using their excellent military training to protect their friends and neighbors.

There are over 3.7 million job-related injuries and illnesses reported every year across the country.  It isn’t known exactly how many of these involve military veterans, but you can bet a fair number of veterans are hurt on the job. 

Sadly, many workers – including hard-working veterans – are wary of filing for workers’ compensation after an accident.  Why?  Shouldn’t injured workers feel confident enough in ‘the system’ to ask for help when they really need it – especially after fighting for our country?

The sad truth is that in this economy workers are often afraid to file claims, worrying that they’ll be blackballed or that they’ll lose their job if they file a workers’ comp claim.  So, let’s all take a moment this Memorial Day pay tribute to our brave veterans, and make sure we’re all doing our part to protect their working rights once they return home to serve us again in a civilian role.

NY Workers: Know the signs of a repetitive motion injury

Many New York workers are at risk of suffering from repetitive strain injuries (also known as repetitive motion or repetitive stress injuries).  These types of injures are especially prone to happen in workers with jobs that involve repeating the same task over and over again, such as a culinary worker, data entry clerk, construction worker, delivery person, housekeeper, and more.

Signs of a repetitive stress injury can show up in a variety of body parts.  New York workers have injured their shoulders, back, wrists, neck, arms, elbows, forearms, thumbs, and fingers while performing repetitive or stressful tasks at work.

If you experience a repetitive stress injury, you may be eligible to receive NY workers’ compensation benefits.  Don’t let your employer dissuade you: repetitive motion injuries are REAL, and can be very painful, making it difficult or impossible for you to work.

Some signs of a repetitive stress injury:

• Weakness in the affected body part
• Tingling, numbness or loss of sensation in the affected body part
• Problems opening and closing your hands
• Stiffness in your joints
• Difficulty using your limbs
• ‘Pins and needles’ in your hands
• Difficulty controlling or coordinating the affected body part
• Problems performing simple tasks like buttoning a shirt or tying shoes
• Tremors, pain, or soreness

Think you are suffering from a repetitive strain injury?  Make sure you see an independent doctor (don’t let your employer or their insurance company pick one for you!) and contact an experienced New York workers’ comp lawyer for help.

Clumsy? Wear high-heels? You still deserve workers’ comp benefits

Here is a great example of why you should never let your employer – or your own guilt – get in the way of claiming the New York workers’ comp benefits that you deserve.  In this situation, a worker slipped in the employee break room while walking past the vending machine.  There was, she claimed, paper from an overflowing trash can in the break room which contributed to her slipping.  She fell, breaking her wrist, and later experienced back and hip pain that persisted.

When she filed for workers’ comp benefits a week later, still in pain, her employer claimed that not only was she clumsy, but she wore high-heels which contributed to her clumsiness.  They did not believe that she deserved compensation for an accident that was clearly her fault.

What are the lessons here?  If you have an unexplained fall while at work and are hurt, the law says you are entitled to New York workers’ comp benefits unless your employer can provide substantial evidence that your fall had nothing to do with work.

In addition, your employer can avoid paying NY workers’ comp benefits only if they can show that you have a pre-existing physical condition that caused your injury, or if they can prove that you were behaving in a blatantly dangerous or inappropriate manner.

This also case shows the importance of a clean, safe working environment, something your employer is required to provide.  The bottom line?  Don’t let your employer intimidate you or blame you for your accident if you really know that you did nothing wrong.  Unless you really did something outrageous and your employer can PROVE it, you deserve workers’ comp benefits.

Who can apply for NY workers’ comp death benefits?

If your family has been rocked by the loss of a loved one to an on-the-job accident, then take heart – there may be help for you.  Immediate families of New York workers killed in a workplace accident are entitled to receive weekly compensation and reimbursement for funeral expenses.

Under the Workers’ Compensation laws, there are a variety of family members who can apply for death benefits after a worker dies on the job.  A claim for compensation in a death case can be filed by:

1. The spouse of the deceased worker;
2. Children of the deceased who are under the age of 18 at the time of the worker’s death;
3. Children of any age who were blind of physically disabled at the time of death, as long as their disablement is total and permanent;
4. Grandchildren, brothers or sisters of the deceased who were under the age of 18 at the time of death and who were wholly or partially dependent on the deceased for financial support at the time of the accident;
5. Parents and grandparents of the deceased who were wholly or partially dependent upon the deceased for support at the time of the accident;
6. Children of the deceased, dependent grandchildren, dependent brothers or dependent sisters of the deceased under the age of 23 who are enrolled and attending as full-time students in any accredited education institution (as long as the worker’s death occurred on or after January 1, 1978).

The deceased worker’s spouse can file a single claim that includes their dependent child / children.  However, each dependent grandchild, brother, sister, parent or grandparent must file their own separate claim.

You can read more about New York workers’ compensation death benefits in our law library article “What you need to know about workers’ comp death benefits”.