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Weekly UpdatesCASE ON POINT: Saunders v. HolzerHosp. Found., OH-2112 (4/30/2009)-OH
ISSUE: An employee who collects workers' compensation from his or her employer cannot successfully sue the employer.
CASE FACTS: On April 23,2006, Alice Saunders suffered a back injury while employed as a delivery-room nurse at Holzer Hospital. She received workers' compensation benefits for her injury under Holzer's self-insured program. Part of her workers' compensation benefits claim included physical therapy that she received at Holzer while "on the clock." Nurse Saunders allegedly suffered an additional injury while undergoing the physical therapy. In her deposition, Saunders admitted that she sought and received additional workers' compensation for the injury that she claimed to have suffered during her physical therapy. She further admitted that Holzer paid all of her benefits and all of her medical bills for the alleged physical therapy injury, and that she continued to receive workers' compensation for the injury. Saunders further stated that she went "to physical therapy as prescribed and required by Holzer for treatment [of her prior injury]. On August 21, 2008, The trial court granted the Holzer's motion for summary judgment. The trial court concluded that: (1) Saunders was an employee of Holzer at the time of her initial injury; (2) Saunders sustained injury "in the course of or ar[ising] out of her employment"; (3) Saunders filed for and receive workers' compensation benefits through Holzer's self-insured workers' compensation plan and received therapy for her injury through Holzer's Work Link program; (4) Saunders' workers' compensation plan called for her to receive physical therapy; (5) Saunders received physical therapy; (6) Saunders, while receiving physical therapy on October 23,2003, allegedly received an injury that aggravated her prior injury; (7) Saunders, at the time of the second injury, was in the employ of Holzer in the maternity ward, and went from her usual work area to the physical therapy department, and was being paid by Holzer while she attended physical therapy; (8) Saunders filed for and received workers' compensation benefits through Holzer's self-insured workers' compensation program for the second injury; and (9) Saunders did not appeal the award of benefits through Holzer's self-insured workers' compensation program for the second injury. The court stated: "The fact that [Saunders] received this injury during therapy and while in the course of or arising out of her employment with Holzer had been determined when she received the award for compensation in the workers' compensation case." The court ruled that Saunders could not recover under Holzer's workers' compensation program and also claim negligence.
COURT'S OPINION: The Court of Appeals of Ohio Affirmed the Judgment entered by the trial in favor of Holzer The court held, inter alia, that the Holzer had fully complied with all of its responsibilities under the state's workers' compensation law. The court was emphatic in its ruling that if an employee receives workers' compensation from his employer, he has absolutely no cause of action against his employer for any alleged negligence.
LEGAL COMMENTARY: The court observed that the doctrine of election of remedies states that the election of one remedial right bars pursuit of another when one right is inconsistent with the other and the election is made with "knowledge and intention and purpose to elect." Traditionally, one purpose of the doctrine of election of remedies is to prevent double recovery and preclude a litigant from pursuing a remedy that, in a previous action, he rejected in favor of an alternative and inconsistent remedy. Another purpose is to prevent needless experimentation with the remedies afforded by law. The prerequisites to application of the doctrine are: (1) The existence of two or more remedies; (2) the inconsistency of such remedies; and (3) a choice of one of them. The court recognized that the doctrine of election of remedies was considered a "harsh and technical rule of procedure that is not favored in Ohio." However, it further observed that in a workers' compensation case, a court, will apply the doctrine when an employee accepts benefits, but later brings an action against his employer alleging negligence. The court noted the fact that the nurse was suing for the negligence of her employer for the injury she sustained while undergoing physical therapy, and not for the injury she sustained in the course of her duties in the maternity ward, there was such a connection between her employment and the fact that she was receiving physical therapy which Holzer paid for, while Saunders was "on the clock," as if she were still performing her duties as a nurse in the hospital's maternity ward. Further, the court observed that while the hospital provided physical therapy services to patients for fees, Nurse Saunders was receiving them in her capacity as an employee who had been injured in the performance of her duties, and was not receiving physical therapy as the ordinary patient would. Accordingly, the court concluded that there was such a nexus between Nurse Saunders' employment and her reporting to the hospital's physical therapy department while being paid as a nurse, created such an overriding identity of Nurse Saunders as an employee, and not as a patient, that she could not sue.
Meet the Editor & Publisher: A. David Tammelleo, JD, is a nationally recognized authority on health care law. Practicing law for over 40 years, he concentrates in health care law with the Rhode Island finn of A. David Tammelleo & Associates. He has presented seminars on medical, nursing and hospital law throughout the United States. In addition to his writings as Editor of Medical Law's, Nursing Law's & Hospital Law's Regan Reports, his legal articles have been published in the most prestigious health law journals. A prolific writer, his thousands of articles, as well as his achievements as an attorney and lecturer, have won him recognition in Martindale-Hubbell's Bar Register of Preeminent Lawyers, Marquis Who Who in American Law, Who's Who in America and Who's Who in the World.
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