Comp case revived for health aide injured in car accident

An Ohio home health aide may be entitled to workers compensation benefits following an injury she sustained in a car accident while traveling between assignments, a state appeals court ruled Thursday.

Pamela Franklin received two assignments on Jan. 23, 2014, from her employer, Cleveland-based BHC Services Inc., requiring her to work three hours in the home of the first client and two hours in the home of the second client, according to a decision issued by the 8th District Ohio Court of Appeals of Ohio. After leaving the home of her first client, Ms. Franklin was involved in a car accident and injured her neck and back. At the time of the accident, she was a passenger in a vehicle belonging to her friend, who was driving her to work at the second client’s home, court records show.

Ms. Franklin filed a comp claim, which was denied by a district hearing officer of the Ohio Industrial Commission. The officer determined that she was a fixed-situs employee whose employment occurred while working at a client’s home, and not while traveling between homes, records show.

Ms. Franklin appealed to the full commission and the Cuyahoga County Court of Common Pleas in Cleveland, both of which upheld the hearing officer’s decision, according to records.

However, a three-judge panel of the appeals court revived Ms. Franklin’s comp appeal. The court said it could not conclude that Ms. Franklin was a fixed-situs employee nor that the state’s workers comp coming-and-going rule excluded her from recovering comp benefits because of several unclear factors. Those factors included who owned the car that Ms. Franklin was injured in, the proximity of the accident to the second patient’s home and whether the travel was logically related to the BHC’s business, the ruling said.

“We conclude that there are genuine issues of material fact as to whether the injury occurred in the course of Franklin’s employment, since it occurred minutes after she left the first client’s home, and while en route to the second client, a duty required by the employer,” the ruling said. “Additionally, there are genuine issues of material fact as to whether the accident arose out of Franklin’s employment, in terms of the proximity of the scene of the accident to the clients’ homes, and the benefit the employer received from the injured employee’s presence there.”

The case was remanded to the Common Pleas court for further proceedings.