FILED Aug 27, 2026 11:00 AM(CT) TENNESSEE
WORKERS' COMPENSATION
APPEALS BOARD
TENNESSEE BUREAU OF WORKERS’ COMPENSATION WORKERS’ COMPENSATION APPEALS BOARD
Jolicia S. Rhodes Docket No. 2025-60-3095
v. State File No. 17421-2025
Allstate Insurance Company, et al.
Appeal from the Court of Workers’ Compensation Claims Lisa A. Lowe, Judge
Affirmed and Certified as Final
In this compensation appeal, the employee contends the trial court erred in finding she did not suffer a compensable mental injury. The employee filed a petition for benefits alleging a mental injury due to “cumulative psychological trauma” in the course and scope of her employment as a claims representative. After the employer denied the claim, the employee then asserted that a specific meeting with her supervisor and a regional manager was the primary cause of her alleged mental injury. Following a hearing, the trial court issued an order denying benefits, finding that the employee’s description of the meeting did not amount to a sudden or unusual mental stimulus as required by the statute. The employee has appealed. Having carefully reviewed the record, we affirm the trial court’s decision and certify it as final.
Judge Meredith B. Weaver delivered the opinion of the Appeals Board in which Presiding Judge Timothy W. Conner and Judge Pele I. Godkin joined.
Jolicia S. Rhodes, employee-appellant, pro se
Allison P. King, Knoxville, Tennessee, for the employer-appellee, Allstate Insurance Company
Factual and Procedural History
Jolicia S. Rhodes (“Employee”) was working as a claims representative in the total loss division of Allstate Insurance Company (“Employer”) when her workload increased in 2022. Employee filed an accommodation request at that time, seeking a modified workload, schedule flexibility, intermittent leave, and a workload adjustment after
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absences, asserting that these accommodations were necessary as a result of her preexisting conditions of major depressive disorder (“MDD”), post-traumatic stress disorder (“PTSD”), attention deficit hyperactive disorder (“ADHD”), and anxiety. The record indicates Employer did not accommodate her requests.
Employee continued to work for Employer despite the lack of accommodations.
She received warnings related to her handling of various claims. In particular, she was given a “first and final” warning in March 2024 regarding her alleged mishandling of a claim the previous month. Although Employee established that the warning was dismissed, she later asserted that defending herself against that warning took time away from her other pending claims.
Employee’s supervisor, Demi Risso, and Regional Manager, Alex Kozial, scheduled a virtual meeting with Employee for March 28, 2024. Employee believed the purpose of this meeting was to discuss her accommodation requests. However, neither Ms. Risso nor Mr. Kozial addressed any of her requests for accommodations during this meeting but instead addressed other matters of a more general nature. According to Employee, her supervisors’ failure to discuss her requests for accommodations caused her extreme emotional distress. She saw her psychiatrist, Dr. Christopher Van Schenk, on April 1, 2024.1 He noted her complaints of increased stress at work and her diagnoses of MDD, PTSD, ADHD, and anxiety. Employee returned to Dr. Van Schenk on April 16, indicating she left work on April 15 due to her ongoing stress. Neither record contains any discussion of the March 28 meeting.2
On March 3, 2025, Employee prepared a First Report of Work Injury (“Form C-
20”) in which she identified the date of injury as April 1, 2024.3 On that form, she described her injury as “dealing with being bullied at work and a hostile work environment” from December 2023 until April 14, 2024. Employer denied Employee’s mental injury claim in April 2025, and Employee filed a petition for benefit determination (“PBD”) on May 13, 2025, specifically alleging she suffered “cumulative psychological trauma to abnormal work[-]related stress without accommodations including retaliatory management actions during protected medical leave, reassignments without support, and overwhelming expectations following absences.” She identified April 1, 2024, or the day she saw Dr. Van Schenk after the March 28 meeting with Ms. Risso and Mr. Kozial, as the date of her alleged injury. Employee then filed a request for a hearing in September accompanied by
1 A letter signed by Dr. Van Schenk on July 1, 2025, indicates he had been treating Employee since “early 2023.” 2 The record indicates Employee did not return to work for Employer until August 25, 2025.
3 There is limited information in the record as to what, if anything, took place between April 15, 2024 and the date Employee submitted the injury report in March 2025, although one of Employee’s filings indicates she became “aware” a mental injury could be a compensable work injury in February 2025.
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her affidavit, in which she stated she had been subjected to a “hostile work environment” due to her request for accommodation and that she suffered from stress due to the “baseless” allegations in her “first and final” warning in March 2024. She admitted she returned to work for Employer in a different capacity in August 2025, but she argued she was entitled to temporary disability benefits from October 2024 to her reinstatement.4
Employee filed numerous medical records in support of her claims, including the July 1 letter from Dr. Van Schenk, in which he stated that, although Employee suffered from preexisting mental health conditions, “approximately 80% of her current psychological condition is attributable to workplace stress.” He also identified specific stressors, which included Employee’s increased workload in 2022, the “first and final” warning in March 2024, a meeting with her supervisor on March 9, 2024, an allegedly “retaliatory” increased workload upon return to work from medical leave, and Employer’s failure to address her requests for various accommodations.
On November 24, 2025, Employee filed a motion to amend the date of her injury from April 1, 2024 to March 28, 2024, the date of the meeting with Ms. Risso and Mr. Kozial. The court denied her motion, and that order was not appealed.
In December 2025, Employee obtained a forensic evaluation with another psychiatrist, Dr. Suja Raju, who prepared both a final medical report (“Form C-30A”) and a Standard Form Medical Report for Industrial Injuries (“Form C-32”). The parties deposed Dr. Raju, and she testified that the meeting on March 28, 2024 was an “escalation point” in Employee’s “mental health issues.” She agreed that she relied on Employee’s subjective interpretation of the meeting and how it impacted Employee in arriving at this opinion. She admitted she did not speak to anyone else that attended the meeting in arriving at her conclusion that it was the primary cause of Employee’s mental health condition. Dr. Raju also acknowledged that she did not use the Sixth Edition of the American Medical Association’s Guides to the Evaluation of Permanent Impairment (“AMA Guides”) in assigning the impairment rating that she included on the Form C-32.5
The trial court held a compensation hearing on April 8, 2026, at which Employee and her partner, Tiffany Smith, provided the only in-person testimony. Employee testified that her workload increased in 2022 and that she was promised a title change and pay raise, neither of which occurred immediately. She testified that from September 2023 to August 2024, she was also working full time for another company, but she denied that working two full time jobs created any extra stress. In regard to the meeting on March 28, she testified that she believed it was to address her request for accommodations, but instead it 4 Employee received short-term disability benefits from April 15 until October 14, 2024.
5 During the deposition, Employee attempted to enter Dr. Raju’s Form C-32 as an exhibit, but Employer objected, citing Dr. Raju’s failure to use the AMA Guides in calculating Employee’s impairment. In its compensation hearing order, the court sustained that objection.
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was a “regular routine meeting.” Employee testified that the tone of the meeting was dismissive, although she acknowledged there was no yelling or raised voices during the meeting and no negative employment actions were taken or discussed. However, Employee testified that this meeting led her to have a “complete breakdown,” causing sleeplessness, panic attacks, and an inability to focus.
Employee’s partner, Ms. Smith, testified that, following the March 28 meeting, she found Employee in the closet sobbing in the dark. After that meeting, according to Ms. Smith, Employee was a different person. She no longer assisted in housekeeping or childrearing duties, despite having previously been the primary caregiver.
In its April 14, 2026 compensation order, the trial court denied Employee’s request for benefits. In examining the language of Tennessee Code Annotated section 50-6- 102(15), which defines “mental injury,” the court concluded that, although the March 28 meeting may have been subjectively stressful to Employee, the meeting could not be objectively classified as a “sudden or unusual stimulus” to a reasonable person. Employee has appealed.
Standard of Review
The standard we apply in reviewing a trial court’s decision presumes that the court’s factual findings are correct unless the preponderance of the evidence is otherwise. See Tenn. Code Ann. § 50-6-239(c)(7) (2025). When the trial judge has had the opportunity to observe a witness’s demeanor and to hear in-court testimony, we give considerable deference to credibility determinations made by the trial court. Madden v. Holland Grp. of Tenn., Inc., 277 S.W.3d 896, 898 (Tenn. 2009). However, “when it comes to deposition testimony, an appellate panel is in the same position as the trial court to make credibility determinations.” Edwards v. Peoplease, LLC, No. W2024-01034-SC-R3-WC, 2025 Tenn. LEXIS 514, at *18 (Tenn. Dec. 22, 2025). Thus, when medical proof is presented by deposition, “the reviewing court may draw its own conclusions about the weight and credibility of the expert testimony.” Id. Moreover, the interpretation and application of statutes and regulations are questions of law that are reviewed de novo with no presumption of correctness afforded the trial court’s conclusions. See Mansell v. Bridgestone Firestone N. Am. Tire, LLC, 417 S.W.3d 393, 399 (Tenn. 2013). We are also mindful of our obligation to construe the workers’ compensation statutes “fairly, impartially, and in accordance with basic principles of statutory construction” and in a way that does not favor either the employee or the employer. Tenn. Code Ann. § 50-6-116 (2025).
Analysis
In the statement of issues attached to her notice of appeal, Employee asserted that the trial court: (1) erred in concluding that she did not suffer a compensable mental injury; (2) failed to consider “the broader sequence” of events, which she described as
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“documented accommodation requests, management and human-resources involvement, disciplinary pressure, and unresolved workplace conflicts”; (3) erred in finding the March 28 meeting constituted ordinary stress; (4) erroneously excluded material evidence documenting her numerous issues at work; and (5) failed to assist Employee in a way she believed to be appropriate. However, in her brief, Employee narrows the issues to what we view as two central arguments: (1) that the court did not apply the law to the facts appropriately when it failed to consider the March 28 meeting in the “context” of her ongoing issues at work and her preexisting conditions; and (2) that the court did not appropriately consider the expert medical proof from Dr. Van Schenk and Dr. Raju.6
Components of Mental Injury
Tennessee Code Annotated section 50-6-102(15) defines a mental injury as “a loss of mental faculties or a mental or behavioral disorder, arising primarily out of a compensable physical injury or an identifiable work[-]related event resulting in a sudden or unusual stimulus . . . .” It has long been the law in this state that “for a mental injury by accident . . . to arise out of employment, it must be caused by an identifiable stressful, work-related event producing a sudden mental stimulus such as fright, shock or excessive unexpected anxiety, and therefore it may not be gradual employment stress building up over a period of time.” Gatlin v. Knoxville, 822 S.W.2d 587, 591-92 (Tenn. 1991). In the context of cases arising after the effective date of the 2013 Workers’ Compensation Reform Act, we have explained that “while separate, identifiable work-related events resulting in a sudden or unusual stimulus can form the basis of a mental injury claim, a ‘gradual’ or cumulative mental injury claim has not been recognized as viable under Tennessee’s Workers’ Compensation Law.” Nickerson v. Knox Cnty. Gov’t, No. 2019-03-0559, 2020 TN Wrk. Comp. App. Bd. LEXIS 52, at *16 (Tenn. Workers’ Comp. App. Bd. Sep. 2, 2020).
Our holding in Nickerson was supported by the Tennessee Supreme Court’s opinion in Saylor v. Lakeway Trucking, Inc., 181 S.W.3d 314 (Tenn. 2005), where the Court addressed a claim for cumulative mental stress and explained:
The performance of any contract of employment, however, produces some degree of emotional stress. Compensation, therefore, is available for neither emotional stress, anxiety, or worry of a general nature nor mental injuries resulting from the accumulation of normal employment-related activities. Rather, the stress must be extraordinary and unusual in comparison to the stress ordinarily experienced by an employee in the same type [of] duty.
6 Employee’s brief did not address the issues she initially raised regarding the exclusion of evidence or the trial court’s alleged failure to assist her during the hearing. Accordingly, those issues are waived. See Moore & Seiferth v. Ingles Mkts., Inc., Nos. 2015-02-0183, 2015-02-0193, 2015 TN Wrk. Comp. App. Bd. LEXIS 54, at *4 (Tenn. Workers’ Comp. App. Bd. Nov. 4, 2015).
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Id. at 320 (internal quotation marks and citations omitted). The Supreme Court’s holding makes clear that courts are to apply an objective, not subjective, standard in analyzing the event or events Employee alleges caused a “sudden or unusual” mental stimulus.
In the present case, the Form C-20 Employee filed indicated an alleged gradual mental injury, which she asserted was caused by “dealing with being bullied at work and a hostile work environment” occurring from December 2023 until April 14, 2024. Her PBD identified a date of injury of April 1, 2024, and specifically stated her mental injury was due to “cumulative trauma.” Although Employee later attempted to amend the date of her injury to March 28, the date of the meeting with her supervisor and regional manager, the trial court denied that request, and that order was not appealed. Therefore, we conclude that, to the extent Employee has alleged a gradual or cumulative mental injury due to a “hostile work environment” caused by an accumulation of workload stresses and frustrations with how her request for accommodation was handled by Employer, her claim is not compensable under the Workers’ Compensation Law.7
With respect to Employee’s assertion that her mental injury is the result of a specific event resulting in a “sudden or unusual stimulus,” namely, the March 28 meeting, we agree with the trial court that there is no evidence this meeting resulted in stress that was “extraordinary and unusual in comparison to the stress ordinarily experienced by an employee in the same type [of] duty.” Saylor, 181 S.W.3d at 320. Although Employee and her partner testified without contradiction that Employee’s reaction to the circumstances of the meeting was severe, we must examine the “stress ordinarily experienced by an employee in the same type [of] duty,” not Employee’s specific reaction. Id. (emphasis added). In other words, the court is to objectively analyze the alleged stressful event from the perspective of a reasonable person in a similar situation. Here, Employee conceded that there was no yelling or confrontation of any kind at the meeting. In fact, Employee acknowledged that her increased stress arose because the meeting was a
7 Employee argues in her reply brief that a set of incidents can cause a compensable mental injury and we do not disagree, as outlined in Nickerson v. Knox County Government, cited above. However, Employee relies on Hoffman v. HCA Health Services of Tennessee, Inc., a case in which the employee alleged a mental injury due to three separate interactions with psychiatric patients that occurred within a four-week period in the course and scope of her employment as a nurse. Hoffman v. HCA Health Care Servs. of Tenn., Inc., No. 2024-60-0181, 2025 TN Wrk. Comp. App. Bd. LEXIS 28, at *2-4 (Tenn. Workers’ Comp. App. Bd. Aug. 12, 2025). Furthermore, that employee alleged that the incidents were all due to security failures by her employer. Id. Before considering whether the claim was a compensable mental injury, the trial court found that the employee failed to give timely notice, and we affirmed that finding. Id. at *17-18. Therefore, Employee’s reliance on Hoffman is misplaced. Regarding the alleged “hostile work environment,” in Potter v. Yapp USA Auto. Sys., Inc., No. M2019-01351-COA-R3-CV, 2020 Tenn. App. LEXIS 232, at *7-8 (Tenn. Ct. App. May 22, 2020), the Tennessee Court of Appeals explained that employees alleging a “hostile work environment” generally must seek remedies pursuant to the Tennessee Human Rights Act, not the Workers’ Compensation Law.
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“regular routine meeting” rather than one to discuss her request for various accommodations.8 Accordingly, we discern no error by the trial court.
Medical Proof
Employee argues in her brief that the medical proof she presented at trial was sufficient to show that the aggravation of her preexisting conditions is compensable despite the trial court’s analysis of Tennessee Code Annotated section 50-6-102(15). Employee correctly noted that Dr. Van Schenk’s medical records reflect his opinion that her preexisting MDD, PTSD, ADHD, and anxiety were “exacerbated” by work events; however, neither his notes nor his causation letters discuss the March 28 meeting in particular. Instead, he listed the causes of the exacerbation as “Employee’s increased workload in 2022, the ‘first and final’ warning on March 2024, a meeting with her supervisor on March 9, 2024, retaliatory overload upon return from work from medical
8 In her brief, Employee argues that the meeting served as sudden or unusual stimulus based on Lawson v. Costar Group, Inc., No. 2024-60-0333, 2025 TN Wrk. Comp App. Bd. LEXIS 2 (Tenn. Workers’ Comp. App. Bd. Jan. 15, 2025). In Lawson, the employee claimed a mental injury caused by the events at a meeting to discuss a performance review that was completed by her supervisor while she had a sexual harassment claim pending against that same supervisor. Id. at *3. The trial court granted the employer’s motion for summary judgment, determining that, in such circumstances, “no reasonable person could have experienced a sudden or unusual mental stimulus beyond normal workplace stress.” Id. at *11. We reversed, stating:
We conclude a critical element in mental injury cases involves application of a “reasonable person” standard, which is generally a question of fact. It is only when the evidence and the inferences to be reasonably drawn from the evidence would permit a reasonable person to reach only one conclusion that a motion for summary judgment should be granted. Moreover, as the Supreme Court has explained, “by definition, . . . summary judgment does not involve fact-finding or the weighing of evidence.” Berry v. Consolidated Sys., Inc., 804 S.W.2d 445, 446 (Tenn. 1991). “Obviously, a trial court should not grant summary judgment where resolution of the case depends upon an interpretation or weighing of the facts.” Id.
Id. at *10-11 (some internal citations and quotation marks omitted). We went on to say:
In granting [the employer’s] dispositive motion, the trial court weighed [the employee’s] evidence regarding the impact of the performance evaluation on a reasonable employee in similar circumstances and resolved this issue of fact in [the employer’s] favor. Although such a result may occur following a full trial on the merits, it is not an appropriate basis on which to award summary judgment.
Id. at *12-13 (emphases added). Although Lawson and the present appeal share some factual similarities, the trial court in Lawson failed to view the evidence in the light most favorable to the nonmoving party, as it was required to do in the context of a motion for summary judgment. That is a much different standard than the standard applicable at a final compensation hearing. Furthermore, in the case at hand, there were no disputed facts regarding the circumstances of the meeting, as Employee’s testimony was unrefuted.
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leave, and Employer’s lack of response to her request for accommodation.”9 Dr. Raju, on the other hand, testified that the meeting caused an escalation of Employee’s conditions but admitted that her opinion was based solely on Employee’s recounting of the meeting. She agreed that the meeting was subjectively stressful from Employee’s perspective, not objectively stressful.10
In short, Employee argues that the trial court did not appropriately consider her preexisting MDD, PTSD, ADHD, and anxiety, as well as the backdrop of the ongoing pressures of her position in determining that a reasonable person would not have found the circumstances of the March 28 meeting to be a “sudden or unusual stimulus.” However, our review of the record shows the court did consider Employee’s prior medical history, the medical documentation by both Dr. Van Schenk and Dr. Raju, and her ongoing requests for accommodation at the time of the meeting before determining that the meeting could not “objectively” be considered a sudden or unusual mental stimulus to an employee in the same type of duty. As stated above, when expert testimony is presented by deposition or documentation as our rules allow, “the reviewing court may draw its own conclusions about the weight and credibility of the expert testimony.” Edwards v. Peoplease, LLC, No. W2024-01034-SC-R3-WC, 2025 Tenn. LEXIS 514, at *18 (Tenn. Dec. 22, 2025). In our review of the medical proof, we agree with the trial court that neither the testimony from Dr. Raju nor the records from Dr. Van Schenk support the occurrence of a work-related mental injury that was primarily caused by an event leading to a sudden or unusual mental stimulus to the reasonable person.11
Conclusion
For the foregoing reasons, we affirm the decision of the trial court and certify the order as final. Costs on appeal are taxed to Employee. 9 In addition, Dr. Van Schenk’s opinions do not support a finding that the March 28 meeting was the “primary” cause of Employee’s alleged mental injury, which is an essential element of her claim. See Tenn. Code Ann. § 50-6-102(12)(B) (2025). 10 Although it is unclear from the record whether Employee is objecting to the trial court’s decision to exclude Dr. Raju’s Form C-32, we do observe that, in order to be admitted, an expert’s opinion must be “based on relevant scientific methods, processes, and data.” McDaniel v. CSX Transp., Inc., 955 S.W.2d 257, 263 (Tenn. 1997). Moreover, for such opinions to be admissible at trial, Tennessee Code Annotated section 50-6-204(k)(2)(C) requires medical experts to use the AMA Guides in evaluating impairment. Not only did Dr. Raju not rely on the AMA Guides in assessing impairment, she testified she had not seen the book before her deposition. Accordingly, we find no abuse of discretion in the trial court’s exclusion of that evidence. Sanford v. Waugh & Co., 328 S.W.3d 836, 847 (Tenn. 2010). 11 Employee also asserts in her brief that Employer’s “alternative theories do not rebut the record.” However, it is Employee who bears the burden of proof on all essential elements of her workers’ compensation claim. See Scott v. Integrity Staffing Sols., No. 2015-05-0055, 2015 TN Wrk. Comp. App. Bd. LEXIS 24, at *6 (Tenn. Workers’ Comp. App. Bd. Aug. 18, 2015). Because we affirm the trial court’s finding that Employee did not meet her burden of proof in the first instance, this issue is pretermitted.