Katie Dye
v.
Pine Heights at Brattleboro Center for Nursing and Rehabilitation
Opinion No. 10-20WC
Vermont Workers Compensation Decisions
State of Vermont Department of Labor
June 16, 2020
Hearing held in Montpelier on January 22, 2020
Record
closed on April 6, 2020
State
File No. KK-63488
Robert
D. Mabey, Esq., for Claimant.
Keith
J. Kasper, Esq., for Defendant.
Stephen W. Brown, Administrative Law Judge.
OPINION
AND ORDER
Michael A. Harrington, Commissioner.
ISSUE
PRESENTED:
What is
the extent, if any, of Claimant’s permanent partial
disability?
EXHIBITS:
Joint
Exhibit 1: Joint Medical Exhibit (“JME”)
Joint
Exhibit 2: Stipulation
Claimant’s
Exhibit 1: Curriculum Vitae of Douglas P. Kirkpatrick, MD
Claimant’s
Exhibit 2: Deposition of Douglas P. Kirkpatrick, MD
Defendant’s
Exhibit A: Curriculum Vitae of William F. Boucher, MD
FINDINGS
OF FACT:
1. I
take judicial notice of all relevant forms and correspondence
in the Department’s file for this claim. I also take
judicial notice of the AMA Guides to the Evaluation of
Permanent Impairment, 5th ed. (the “AMA Guides”).
2.
Claimant is a 27-year-old woman who presently resides in
Grand Isle, Vermont. As of April 2018, she resided in
Newfane, Vermont, and was employed as a licensed practical
nurse and charge nurse at Defendant’s long-term care
facility in Brattleboro, Vermont. In that role, she managed
the care of 29 residents and oversaw the work of other floor
staff. Her average weekly wage for the period relevant to
this case was $1,105.00. (See Joint Exhibit 2).
3. On
April 29, 2018, Claimant was performing a safety check at the
beginning of her shift when she noticed that a male resident
was attempting to “self-transfer.” Knowing that
this resident was not capable of self-transfer, Claimant
entered his room to assist. The resident lost his balance
while Claimant was standing in front of him, and she reached
her right arm out to prevent him from hitting his head on the
bed-side table.
4.
Claimant weighed approximately 110 pounds at the time of the
incident and credibly estimated that the resident weighed
approximately 200 pounds.
5.
Claimant temporarily bore the resident’s full weight
with her right arm but stabilized herself on the
resident’s bed with her left arm. She was eventually
able to move the resident back onto his bed.
6. She
immediately felt pain down through her back underneath her
scapula and numbness and tingling down her arm into all the
fingers of her right hand. She experienced muscle spasms in
her right shoulder and stabbing pains in her back and the
inside of her right forearm. After the incident, she also
experienced a significant decrease in right-hand grip
strength and had trouble holding on to items in that hand.
7. On
May 2, 2018, she presented to ClearChoiceMD Urgent Care in
Brattleboro, where her nurse practitioner suspected a rotator
cuff injury and prescribed muscle relaxants and nonsteroidal
anti-inflammatory drugs. She was released to light-duty work
at that time. (JME 1-2).
8.
After one day of light-duty work, her symptoms worsened. She
returned to the urgent care center on May 7, 2018, with
complaints of pain and shoulder tenderness and scapular
winging. At that time, she started taking prednisone and
began physical therapy. (JME 3-10).
9. For
the rest of that month, Claimant treated with injections,
gabapentin, and other conservative modalities. (JME 13-46).
In June 2018, her pain became so severe that she visited the
Brattleboro Memorial Hospital’s emergency department
(JME 47-56), where she was taken out of work entirely until
further notice. (JME 56, 60).
10.
Later that month, she followed up with orthopedic specialists
and also underwent electrodiagnostic and MRI studies, neither
of which revealed any specific abnormalities. (See JME
71-78). However, her providers still kept her out of work.
(JME 79). She continued to experience significant pain and
complained to her providers of numbness in her fingers,
weakness in her hand and arm, and of problems continually
dropping things. She began treating with trigger point dry
needling (e.g., JME 84-89, 96-99), and by August 2018, her
physician recommended a more active physical therapy regime
as well as trigger point injections. (JME 112-114).
11. In
September 2018, Claimant began receiving psychological
counseling for anxiety and depression related to her pain and
functional limitations. (E.g., JME 160-163). That same month,
she also began a work hardening program that consisted of
seven two-hour sessions over approximately two weeks and
involved exercises designed to increase her work capacity.
Although she had difficulty tolerating these sessions and
often had to end early due to worsened shoulder symptoms, she
made functional gains during that program. Nonetheless, she
continued to experience increased right arm pain afterward.
(JME 183). In November 2018, she was released back to work
with restrictions...
