When it comes to California workers’ compensation law, an injury is considered cumulative when it includes: “repetitive mentally or physically traumatic activities extending over a period of duration at the workplace, the combined effect of which causes any disability or need for medical treatment.” Cumulative trauma is different from a specific injury, which is an injury arising out of a single incident. Because it is not a single incident, an employee may not know he or she has a cumulative trauma until he or she is told by a doctor.
This means that it could be months or even years after an employee stops working before he or she realizes that there is an injury caused by work.
The statute of limitation in the State of California is one (1) year from learning the cumulative trauma injury was caused by work to file a workers’ compensation claim.
Work injuries are most commonly thought of as a single event such as a fall or an injury that occurs while lifting something. But injuries don’t always happen on a specific day, at a specific time. There are also injuries that happen over a longer period of time of the duration of your workplace.
In California workers’ compensation, there are two types of work injuries:
Example: Tony injures was told to drive to deliver a product and while driving he was rear ended. This is a specific injury.
Example: Tony injures his back from lifting twenty-pound boxes every day for eight months. This is a cumulative trauma injury.
Both of these injuries are due to Tony’s work. But the cause is different.
A cumulative trauma is a repetitive event. It is a culmination of thousands of minor movements that by themselves would not cause an injury, but together cause injury to a part of the body.
The time period for a cumulative trauma is the time the injured worker is doing the work that is causing the injury and ends when there is disability or need for medical treatment. The disability can be a temporary disability or permanent disability.
Example: Jackie works as a mail carrier from May 23, 2021 to December 10, 2023. She stopped working on December 10, 2023 due to pain in her right knee.
The time of Jackie’s cumulative trauma exposure is from May 23, 2021 to December 10, 2023.
A cumulative trauma must be determined separately from a specific injury because if the injury is over a period of time:
Commencing from 2020 through 2024, for certain firefighters and peace officers, “injury” also includes post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD).
A specific injury is the result of one incident that causes disability or need for medical treatment. It is improbable that an employee would be unaware of a specific injury because a single incident is hard to miss. If an employee falls down a home he was doing construction work or slips and falls or feels a sharp pain in his or her back while lifting a box, the cause of the injury is clear. The employee has the obligation to tell his or her employer what happened.
In a cumulative trauma situation, there isn’t a single incident. Whatever exposure is occurring or damage being done may not be clear until much later. Even if there are symptoms, the cause may be hard to figure out.
These are common cumulative trauma orthopedic injuries:
Example: Henry works as an paralegal for a law firm for 8 years. He began to get pain in her wrists during work. He eventually had pain all the time.
Henry’s doctor said her wrist pain was carpal tunnel syndrome from repetitively typing at work.
Common cumulative internal injuries include:
Example: Steve was a mechanic for 15 years and was exposed to exhaust while working a garage. He developed lung cancer.
The medical evidence showed that inhaling the vehicle exhaust was the cause of Steve lung cancer.
If a worker that was injured does not make a claim for benefits from a work injury within a certain period of time, also known as the “Statute of limitations,” he or she can be put a stop to from receiving any benefits.
The statute of limitations in California for a workers’ compensation claim is one (1) year from the date the injury was sustained.
The statute of limitations protects the insurance company from having to defend a claim long after the face to defend it is exhausted. Nevertheless, an injured worker is not obligated to notify anyone until he or she knows that the injury was caused by the workplace.
Therefore, since it can be hard for an injured worker to know if he or she has a cumulative trauma, the date of injury and statute of limitations needs to be adjusted for cumulative trauma cases beyond the period of exposures rendered.
Example: Julie could not work due to wrist pain. Thirteen months after she stopped working she became aware that the injury was caused by her work. She files a workers’ compensation claim.
The insurance company says that because Julie had not worked in 13 months, the one-year statute of limitations had run out, and her ability to file a claim had exhausted.
But Julie can still file her claim because the date of injury is the date that she became aware her injury was caused by the workplace, not when she stopped working. Although this was 13 months after she stopped working, the one year statute of limitations did not start until 13 months later.
Example: Curtis, a construction worker, has emphysema and stops working. He does not know if his emphysema was caused by work. He has no reason to think dusty conditions at work were the cause until he reads a newspaper article about it three years after he stops working. He then files a claim and is within the statute of limitations.
The date of injury of a cumulative trauma is when:
and the employee:
Many people, even attorneys, confuse the time period of cumulative trauma exposure with the date of injury of cumulative trauma.
The sole reason for moving the date of injury for the statute of limitations is to ensure that no employee is barred from getting workers’ compensation benefits before he or she is aware they have sustained an injury.
The one-year statute of limitations for filing a workers’ compensation claim for a cumulative trauma does not start until the injured worker knows the injury is from work.
Example: Amber has worked in an assembly plant since 2020. She has severe migraines. Due to the migraine she stops working on March 3, 2021. On November 2, 2023 a doctor tells her that the migraines were caused by a chemical she was exposed to at work.
The period she was working and exposed to the chemicals that caused her migraines was between 2020 and March 3, 2023.
However, she did not find out if her headaches were caused by work until she went to the doctor on November 2, 2023. This means the date of injury is from 2020 to November 2, 2023.
For the one-year statute of limitations, she would have until November 2, 2023 to file her claim.
An injured worker does not have to be working to file a claim for a California workers’ compensation for cumulative trauma injury. It doesn’t matter if the injured worker has decided to retire.
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