Kennedy v. Williams-McWilliams Industries, Inc.

156 So. 2d 806, 247 Miss. 595, 1963 Miss. LEXIS 329
CourtMississippi Supreme Court
DecidedOctober 21, 1963
DocketNo. 42762
StatusPublished
Cited by4 cases

This text of 156 So. 2d 806 (Kennedy v. Williams-McWilliams Industries, Inc.) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Mississippi Supreme Court primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Kennedy v. Williams-McWilliams Industries, Inc., 156 So. 2d 806, 247 Miss. 595, 1963 Miss. LEXIS 329 (Mich. 1963).

Opinion

Kyle, J.

This case is before us on appeal by Jim Kennedy, claimant, from a judgment of the Circuit Court of Washington County reversing an order of the Mississippi Workmen’s Compensation Commission awarding [597]*597compensation to the claimant for temporary total disability for a knee injury sustained by the appellant on August 24, 1961, while engaged in the performance of bis duties as an employee of the appellee ‘Williams-McWilliams Industries, Incorporated.

The record shows that at the time of bis injury the appellant was a member of a dredging crew engaged in dredging sand on a sand bar in the Mississippi River, near Rosedale in Bolivar County. The accident occurred during the early afternoon of August 24, 1961, while the appellant was driving a wedge in the sand with a sledge hammer. The sledge hammer bit a glancing lick and struck the shin of the appellant’s left leg midway between bis knee and bis ankle. The appellant was examined and treated by Dr. W. C. Moore of Rosedale a few hours later. The treatment was for a small bruise, hematoma, and a slight abrasion seepage. The doctor told the appellant to go on back to work and if bis injury gave him trouble to come back the next day. The appellant returned to work the following day, and worked until bis employment was terminated during the week ending September 23, 1961. The appellant was next seen by Dr. Moore for treatment on September 26 and at that time the appellant complained of pain in the left leg which be said radiated up into bis knee. The doctor did not x-ray the appellant’s knee but gave him a light medicine to satisfy him, and the doctor told him to come back on October 3. The appellant went back to Rosedale on October 3 for treatment as requested, but was not treated because of the absence of Dr. Moore from bis office. The appellant was next seen by Dr. M. A. Creekmore in G-reenville, Mississippi, and was referred by him to Dr. H. Nelson Hamilton, an orthopedic surgeon. He was examined by Dr. Hamilton on October 6 and again on October 10. He was hospitalized for a period of conservative treatment on October 27. [598]*598He stated at that time that he had no evidence of knee difficulty prior to the accident of August 24.

Dr. Hamilton, who was called to testify as a witness for the appellant, stated that the appellant remained in the hospital about two weeks, and was given active range of motion exercises under supervision of the physiotherapist. The doctor stated that he thought the appellant’s condition had improved somewhat during the two weeks period and he discharged him from the hospital. But the appellant came back a few days later still having trouble, and the doctor referred him to Dr. Fred Sage of Campbell’s Clinic, in Memphis, Tennessee, for consultation. Dr. Sage saw the appellant on December 5. At this point the doctor was asked the following question and gave the following answer:

“Q. After this consultation with the doctor in Memphis, Dr. Hamilton, then what did you do or what treatment was prescribed?
“A. I saw the patient later. He came in and complained of more severe pain in the knee, and on examination on December 26,1 detected a positive McMurray’s sign of “clump” in the knee joint when I flexed the knee and externally rotated the tibia on the femur and extended the knee, made me feel that the medial cartilage was definitely either torn or unstable and I admitted the patient to the hospital and operated on him on 12-29-62 and repaired the medial collateral ligament, plicated it and tightened it, and excised the medial meniscus which was very atretic and had a transverse tear in the mid-portion. I followed him in the office since that time on gradually increasing weig*ht bearing and injected Hydeltra • — • T. B. A. in the knee on one or two occasions. He is still complaining of pain in the knee and still hasn’t returned to work. He has not reached maximum medical benefit at present but is rapidly improving. In summary, I feel that the patient had a partial tear or laxity of the medial collateral ligament [599]*599of the knee; that he had a degenerated medical meniscus and a transverse tear of the medial meniscus in the knee; that he had rather marked hypertrophic arthritis of the knee, as noted at the time of surgery. ’ ’

The doctor was then asked: “Q. Now doctor, with relationship to the cartilage condition that you have described, do you have an opinion that you can express with reasonable medical certainty, what the causal relationship was between that condition and the accident of hitting his leg* with the sledge hammer as recorded in your history on August 24, 1961?” His answer was: “A. As I previously stated, at the time of my original examination and at the time of each admission to the hospital and on every occasion that I’ve seen the patient since that time, he’s adamantly denied to me ever having any pre-existing knee difficulty, and based upon that fact and based upon what I found at surgery, I feel that the patient had a definite pre-existing hypertrophic arthritis of the knee, or degenerative arthritis of the knee, and if the history be true, there’s something happened at the time of the accident causing further internal derangement of the left knee joint and precipitated in the train of events that subsequently occurred.”

The doctor was later asked this question:

“Doctor, do you have an opinion that you can express with reasonable medical certainty that, if a person has hypertrophic arthritis, such as you found in this claimant, can it or can it not be dormant for years, and will or will not trauma light up that condition?”

His answer was:

“It can be dormant for years and, certainly, trauma can light it up or aggravate it.”

There was a sharp conflict in the testimony of appellant’s witnesses and the testimony of appellee’s witnesses concerning the appellant’s physical condition prior to his injury on August 24. It was the contention of the appellee throughout the hearing that the appel[600]*600lant’s physical disability fox- which he claimed compensation bexxefits was not causally related to the injury suffered by the appellant on August 24, but was due entirely to the crippling effects of a disabling preexisting arthritis. But several witnesses, who had worked with the appellant or had been closely associated with the appellaxxt for a period of several years, testified that the appellant, prior to his ixxjury of August 24, had “got arouxid” like a normal man axxd had xxot complaixxed of his legs; axxd the appellees ’ owxx witness Louis Shelton testified that the first thing he did after the appellaxxt was hired by McWilliams Industries in June 1961, was to take the appellaxxt to a doctor for a physical examination.

On the question of whether the claimant’s present disability was causally related to the injury of August 24, 1961, the attorney referee summarized the medical testimoxxy as follows: “It was the testimony of Dr. W. C. Moore that a torn cartilage is difficult to diag*nose; that he did xxot consider a knee injury in his diagnose axxd treatment; that if claimant had sustained a knee ixxjury it would have locked. Dr. Hamilton was of the opinion that claimaxxt had demonstrable evidexxce of a pre-existing arthritis of the knee axxd that the injury for which surgery was performed was caused by the acciclexxt of August 24.”

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Bluebook (online)
156 So. 2d 806, 247 Miss. 595, 1963 Miss. LEXIS 329, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/kennedy-v-williams-mcwilliams-industries-inc-miss-1963.