Engstrom, Katerina v. Chattanooga Billiards Club

2019 TN WC 15
CourtTennessee Court of Workers' Compensation Claims
DecidedJanuary 27, 2019
Docket2018-01-0404
StatusPublished

This text of 2019 TN WC 15 (Engstrom, Katerina v. Chattanooga Billiards Club) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Tennessee Court of Workers' Compensation Claims primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Engstrom, Katerina v. Chattanooga Billiards Club, 2019 TN WC 15 (Tenn. Super. Ct. 2019).

Opinion

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TENNESSE BUREAU OF WORKERS’ COMPENSATION IN THE COURT OF WORKERS’ COMPENSATION CLAIMS

AT CHATTANOOGA Katerina Engstrom, ) Docket No.: 2018-01-0404 | FIRED Employee, ) Less AMCED) Vv. ) WORKERS’ COMPENSATION Chattanooga Billiards Club, ) State File No.: 25193-2018 “ Employer, ) And ) Eastern Alliance Insurance Group, ) Judge Thomas Wyatt Carrier, ) and ) Abigail Hudgens, Administrator of the ) Bureau of Workers’ Compensation ) Subsequent Injury and Vocational ) Recovery Fund. )

EXPEDITED HEARING ORDER (DECISION ON THE RECORD)

This matter came before the Court on January 23, 2019, upon Katerina Engstrom’s Request for Expedited Hearing seeking medical benefits for bilateral knee and psychological injuries.’ Chattanooga Billiards Club (CBC) defended on the ground that Ms. Engstrom failed to establish that her alleged injuries arose primarily out of and in the course and scope of employment. For the reasons below, the Court holds that Ms. Engstrom will likely prevail in a hearing on the merits in her claim for medical benefits for her bilateral knee injuries but will not likely do so as to psychiatric care.

History of Claim

Ms. Engstrom, a manager of CBC’s bar and restaurant, alleged she slipped on a wet floor and fell onto both knees in April 2018. Co-worker Thomas Braxton stated that he observed Ms. Engstrom fall backward onto her elbow without striking her knees on anything, and that she held her elbow after the fall.

"Ms. Engstrom asked for a decision on the record, to which no one objected.

1 CBC accepted Ms. Engstrom’s injury as compensable and authorized treatment at a walk-in clinic. The physician at the walk-in clinic referred her to an orthopedist in May, when she selected Dr. Michael Tew from a panel.

Ms. Engstrom told Dr. Tew that she underwent arthroscopic surgeries of both knees in 1999, but she related her current pain to “a slip and fall at work May °18 landing on both knees.”” After obtaining MRIs, Dr. Tew diagnosed fractures of the upper end of her right tibia, a “spontaneous disruption of [the] anterior cruciate ligament of [the] right knee,” and an “arthritic bone bruise [in the left] patella.”

On June 27, Dr. Tew checked “YES” to the following question from Ms. Engstrom’s counsel: “As per the above-cited ‘greater than 50%’ standard, did Ms. Engstrom’s April 5, 2018 fall at work onto her bilateral extremities aggravate, exacerbate, or advance her pre-existing lower extremity condition and the need for treatment?” Dr. Tew performed authorized knee surgeries in July and November.

On July 11, Dr. Tew recorded that Ms. Engstrom “is getting depressed and has been placed on Prozac[.]” He made a “psychiatry referral for exacerbation of psych issues since her knee injury,” since he could not treat this condition. He wrote “she wants to see a different psychiatrist from the VA doctor.”

CBC initially filed a Notice of Denial of the alleged psychiatric injury, claiming that it did not arise primarily out of and in the course and scope of employment. In July and October, CBC provided different panels of psychiatrists that Ms. Engstrom rejected due to the fact that some of the listed providers were unwilling to accept workers’ compensation patients and others practiced outside her community.

Ms. Engstrom tired of the delay in obtaining a psychiatry panel and sought care on her own. In late November, Dr. M. Aslam Sandvi agreed to accept her as a patient. Ms. Engstrom saw him on December 10 and paid for the treatment herself.

Dr. Sandvi noted that Ms. Engstrom expressed feelings of hopelessness and helplessness, high levels of anxiety, and periodic panic attacks. Ms. Engstrom told him about post-traumatic stress disorder, with periodic flashbacks and nightmares, from the military assault for which she began receiving treatment through the Veterans Administration in June 2018. He also noted Ms. Engstrom’s reported preoccupation with chronic pain in her knees and workers’ compensation problems. He further recorded that she verbalized anger and frustration about mistreatment by her employer and her

* Ms. Engstrom’s Veterans Administration records indicated she underwent arthroscopic surgeries on her right knee in 1999 and 2013, and on her left knee in 2005 and 2013. Ms. Engstrom testified that she had two right-knee surgeries and one left-knee surgery before her injury at CBC.

= difficulty in obtaining psychiatric treatment. Ms. Engstrom also told Dr. Sandvi that she did not require psychiatric medication before her fall.°

Dr. Sandvi diagnosed recurrent severe major depression and generalized severe anxiety, panic and severe post-traumatic stress disorders. He stated the following on causation and treatment:

It is more likely than not (i.e. greater than 50%) that Ms. Engstrom’s work related accident on April 5, 2018 exacerbated her pre-existing psychiatric condition, necessitating additional mental health treatment under worker’s compensation[.] She is receiving treatment for post- traumatic stress disorder at the VA outpatient clinic. She will need psychiatric treatment for her severe depression and anxiety disorder.

Dr. Sandvi prescribed medication and counseling to treat the work-related aspects of Ms. Engstrom’s psychiatric condition.

CBC introduced Ms. Engstrom’s records from the VA, which indicated that she sought knee treatment beginning April 12, 2016, when she complained of her knees being painful, popping and giving way. The right knee was worse than the left. X-ray findings included minimal to mild osteophytosis at the medial margin of the right tibial plateau and minimal tricompartmental osteophytosis on the left.

In July 2016, Ms. Engstrom reported her right-knee pain made it difficult to walk. An x-ray indicated no bony deformity, and an MRI showed degenerative changes related to previous meniscal surgeries and a subchondral cyst in the medial tibial platform. Ms. Engstrom underwent three right-knee injections. On January 18, 2018, the VA note indicated she was considering right-knee-replacement surgery. A later note stated she underwent an MRI after she fell at CBC. It revealed a moderate bone contusion and nondisplaced trabecular fractures in the upper part of her right tibia.

As to psychiatric care, the VA records documented that Ms. Engstrom first sought treatment on June 4, 2018, for daily panic attacks and anxiety related to her recent attempt to process a sexual assault she suffered in the 1980s while in the military. The VA did not record that Ms. Engstrom related her psychiatric symptoms at that time to knee pain. On June 18, Ms. Engstrom reported that she suffered depression and anxiety for several years because of the assault and twice considered suicide. VA providers began her on a course of psychotropic medications including Trazadone.

On July 24, a VA provider noted that Ms. Engstrom complained because the agency denied her disability benefits for the assault, writing that she said: “[w]hat upsets

3 The submitted VA records corroborate this statement.

3 me is that a person that sits at a desk . . . decided to tell me that there is nothing wrong with me or if there is . . . it did not start with my assault. My whole life got messed up from that experience.” The only mention in this note of Ms. Engstrom’s work injury related to her intent to return to work after surgery.

A VA provider noted on August 17 that Ms. Engstrom was concerned that problems with her left knee would derail her plan to return to work. She stated that “waiting is very difficult” and expressed anger that the workers’ compensation carrier only authorized eight physical therapy sessions. This complaint was in addition to continuing complaints of depression and anxiety related to her assault.

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Related

§ 50-6-012
Tennessee § 50-6-012(14)(E)

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