Worker presented evidence that injury caused depression

A worker with preexisting depression showed that her workplace injury exacerbated her mental health condition, the Pennsylvania Commonwealth Court held in a decision released Thursday.

In Pocono Medical Center v. Workers Compensation Appeal Board, the court unanimously affirmed a worker’s petition for review of her workers compensation claim and dismissed her employer’s bid to terminate her workers comp benefits. 

In 2009, Sharon Springer, who was a phlebotomist for Pocono Medical Center in East Stroudsburg, Pennsylvania, was attacked by a patient, resulting in a pinched nerve to her spinal cord. Her claim for workers compensation was approved. In 2015, the medical center filed a modification petition, seeking to terminate her benefits. Ms. Springer argued that the injury had exacerbated her preexisting condition of major depressive disorder, stating that her injury made her depressed and anxious, and led to a hospitalization for suicidal thoughts. She also presented evidence that she had not seen a psychiatrist until her workplace injury, and the psychiatrist testified that she developed depression as a result of chronic pain from the work injury. The medical center’s psychiatrist said Ms. Springer had been diagnosed with depression and anxiety prior to her injury.

The workers compensation judge granted continued benefits to the phlebotomist, holding that the treatment she received the year prior to her injury was mainly for migraine headaches, noting that the psychiatrists admitted that a major injury could exacerbate pre-existing depression.

The Commonwealth Court affirmed the decision, holding that the judge did not abuse his discretion in allowing Ms. Springer to expand the description of her work injury and continuing workers compensation.

The court accepted as true the psychiatrist’s testimony that Ms. Springer’s “debilitating depression” was caused by the work injury because prior to the injury she had been “fully functional” and able to work and that the pain from the work injury was driving the depression.

The court also noted that medical center’s psychiatrist admitted that depression can be aggravated by a tragic event, and that an individual’s inability to do things she was able to do prior to the injury “could lead to depression and anxiety.”