What the panel ordered
Affirmed the WCJ's Findings, Orders and Award except amended the permanent disability indemnity commencement date to April 17, 2014; deferred attorney fees and commutation issues; returned matter to WCJ for further proceedings on deferred issues.
Defendant sought reconsideration of the WCJ's June 11, 2019 Findings, Orders and Award; WCJ recommended denial of the petition; the Board granted reconsideration to further study factual and legal issues and issued this decision affirming the F&A with amendments and deferrals.
What was disputed, and how it came out
Each issue the panel decided, with the reasoning it gave. An outcome is what this panel did on this record — not a rule, and not a prediction.
The Board agreed with the WCJ and AME Dr. Seymour Levine that the lymphatic cancer was caused by employment and constituted a cumulative injury merged with the prior cardiovascular injury, consistent with statutory and case law.
From the decision · page 3Having reviewed the trial record, we agree with the WCJ that based on the reports and deposition testimony of the internal medicine agreed medical examiner (AME) Seymour Levine, M.D., and the Labor Code section 3212.1 presumption, the cause of applicant's lymphatic cancer was his 27 years of employment by defendant as a deputy sheriff. (Report, p. 4; F&A, p. 5, Amended Opinion on Decision.) When multiple body parts are injured contemporaneously, such as during an identical cumulative trauma period, they are considered a single injury. (State Comp. Ins. Fund v. Workers' Comp. Appeals Bd. (Hurley) (1977) 70 Cal.App.3d 599 [42 Cal.Comp.Cases 481]; see also Hegglin v. Workers' Comp. Appeals Bd. (1971) 4 Cal.3d 162 [36 Cal.Comp.Cases 93].)