Dupre v. Calcasieu Southern Maid Paper Co.

269 So. 2d 308, 1972 La. App. LEXIS 6733
CourtLouisiana Court of Appeal
DecidedOctober 27, 1972
DocketNo. 4008
StatusPublished
Cited by1 cases

This text of 269 So. 2d 308 (Dupre v. Calcasieu Southern Maid Paper Co.) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Louisiana Court of Appeal primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Dupre v. Calcasieu Southern Maid Paper Co., 269 So. 2d 308, 1972 La. App. LEXIS 6733 (La. Ct. App. 1972).

Opinions

DOMENGEAUX, Judge.

This is a suit for workmen’s compensation benefits wherein plaintiff alleges her total and permanent disability as the result of a cardiovascular accident. The district court rejected her demands and she appeals.

The evidence shows that plaintiff had been employed by defendant for some sixteen years as a bag machine operator. It was her job to stand beside a paper bag making machine and bundle the bags as the machine produced them.

On April 15, 1969, plaintiff reported for work at approximately 11:00 P.M. and was to have worked until 7:00 A.M. of the following day. Toward the end of her shift she was operating a machine to which she was not accustomed, and which produced small bags numbering 500 to a bundle. [309]*309The bundles, which weighed approximately three pounds each, were stacked ten high and three across on a table beside the machine. Ordinarily these bundles are removed by attendants called rn.ach.ine tenders, but on the morning in question plaintiff’s efforts to summon such a tender proved futile. Accordingly, as the bags piled up on her table, she pushed them to make room for more. Pushing the ninety or so pounds of bags required considerable exertion on plaintiff’s part, and caused her to feel what she described as a stabbing pain in her chest.

The pain was so intense that plaintiff felt that she was about to faint, so she turned off her machine and sat on her work table. That is the last thing that she remembered occurring prior to her awakening in a hospital. She has not worked since that date and states that even slight exertion around the house produces severe chest pain.

Defendant called two fellow employees of plaintiff’s who were witnesses to the incident. They testified that they found plaintiff sitting on her table crying and that she was carried to the plant’s first aid room and from there taken to the hospital by ambulance. Although she appeared to be conscious, she was not talking and she seemed to be having trouble breathing. At 8:45 A.M., April 16, 1969, she was admitted to Savoy Memorial Hospital, in Ma-mou, Louisiana, with a diagnosis of possible myocardial infarction.

Her treating physician was Dr. Frank P. Savoy, Jr., although she was admitted by another physician on the former’s behalf. Dr. Savoy had also treated plaintiff for a previous heart ailment at which time she had almost certainly suffered a myocardial infarction. On the former occasion she was admitted to the hospital on August 18, 1968, and released on September 6, 1968, with Dr. Savoy concluding that she had an “acute myocardial infarct”. The doctor advised her not to return to work as she was suffering from arteriosclerotic heart disease.

Nevertheless, plaintiff did return to her former employment, after having received the approval of the company physician, Dr. Archie B. Osborn, in October, 1968. She was put to work on machines which she, at least, considered to be lighter duty than those which she had previously operated. She was able to carry out her duties until the morning of April 16, 1969, at which time, as aforesaid, she was operating an unfamiliar and more difficult machine, and while doing so suffered the accident herein sued for.

Following her admission to the hospital on April 16, 1969, she was given two electrocardiograms and enzyme tests, all of which failed to show any abnormality. The following day she was much improved, and she was released with a diagnosis of angina pectoris. Dr. Savoy again told plaintiff not to return to work, more emphatically this time, stating that she should not work if she wanted to keep living. Although Dr. Savoy conceded that attacks of angina pectoris could occur at any time, he was of the opinion that working would pre-dispose plaintiff to having them. It was his further opinion that the straining episode described by plaintiff could have caused the attack of angina pectoris, but he could not definitely state that it had.

Dr. Roderick Perron, who had treated •plaintiff for a cardiac difficulty a few days prior to the myocardial infarction of August, 1968, was skeptical that she had ever had an infarction at all. He too opined, however, that if she did suffer a myocardial infarction she would be more predisposed to further injury in the future, that working would increase the likelihood of angina pectoris pains as such are produced by insufficient blood flow to the heart, and that when angina pectoris appears she should cease working. In that connection he admitted that Dr. Savoy was in a better position to determine whether [310]*310plaintiff had a myocardial infarction than was he.

The electrocardiograms performed on plaintiff were sent to Dr. John R. Seabury of the Louisiana State University Medical School for his interpretation. Dr. Seabu-ry, an internist, concluded from the electrocardiograms that plaintiff had in all probability suffered a myocardial infarction in August of 1968 and that because of that, she was more susceptible to a heart attack on April 16, 1969, than the average person would be. She did not, however, have another infarction on that date insofar as the doctor could tell from reading the electrocardiograms. When presented with a hypothetical question asking that he assume plaintiff to have had angina pecto-ris and fainted while performing the unusually strenuous activity of pushing the stacked bags, he stated that it would be fair to say that the pushing of the bags probably precipitated the attack of angina pectoris. Dr. Seabury would not advise plaintiff to refrain from any type of work, but considering his personal inspection of the electrocardiograms and assuming the occurrence of the incident said by her to have taken place on April 16, 1969, he would advise her not to continue doing the same type of work.

Dr. Archie B. Osborn was the physician primarily employed by defendant to examine applicants for employment, treat emergency cases, etc., and was paid a retainer by defendant for such services. He came into contact with plaintiff on July 16, 1968, at which time he thought she had suffered a heart attack and, at her request, he sent her to Dr. Savoy. On October 28, 1968, he again saw plaintiff and examined her with the object of determining her fitness to return to work. As aforesaid, he gave her his approval and she resumed her position in defendant’s employ. Dr. Osborn next saw plaintiff on April 23, 1969, following the difficulty forming the basis of this suit. On that occasion he refused to permit her return to work as to have allowed her to work would, in his opinion, be a risk to the company.

On behalf of defendant, and at its request, plaintiff was examined on March 13, 1970, by Dr. George M. Anderson, an internist from Lake Charles, Louisiana. This physician testified that he found muscle tenderness which, to him, explained plaintiff’s chest pains. He was of the opinion that plaintiff had heart disease in 1968 but did not have a myocardial infarction even then. He attributed her difficulty of April, 1969, to myositis of the inter-costal muscles, pectoral muscle and scalen-us muscle on the left. Since he thought her present difficulty to be due strictly to muscular skeletal pain, he considered her fit to return to her normal employment.

The evidence, then, establishes to our satisfaction that plaintiff suffered a myocardial infarction in August, 1968, and subsequently returned to her employment.

Free access — add to your briefcase to read the full text and ask questions with AI

Related

Dupre v. Calcasieu Southern Maid Paper Co.
271 So. 2d 260 (Supreme Court of Louisiana, 1973)

Cite This Page — Counsel Stack

Bluebook (online)
269 So. 2d 308, 1972 La. App. LEXIS 6733, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/dupre-v-calcasieu-southern-maid-paper-co-lactapp-1972.