Workers Compensation
Impairment Ratings in Workers’ Compensation Cases – Is Yours Correct?
What is an impairment rating? In a Tennessee workers’ compensation claim, one of the most important variables that determines what an injured worker can receive in a monetary disability award is the permanent partial impairment rating assigned for the employee’s injury. Making sure our clients receive the correct rating is one of the many ways…
Read MoreWill I Be Fired for Making a Workers’ Compensation Claim in Tennessee?
If you’re injured at work in Tennessee, it is illegal for the employer to fire you if you make a claim. Now rest assured if you get put on restrictions and you’re not able to do the job after your injury, the employer can let you go. If it’s also a very small company and…
Read MoreShould I Close My Medical Benefits in My Workers’ Compensation Case?
In these uncertain times of health insurance in America, it’s not wise for you to close out your medical benefits in your workers’ compensation case. If you settle your claim with open benefits, then you receive those medical benefits for your entire life, for whatever treatment is needed for this injury, so long as the…
Read MoreWhy Does Workers’ Compensation Law Suck So Bad in Tennessee?
This is a terrible topic to discuss, because we fought against these changes so hard for so long; we could just not get people to listen. Back in the 2013 legislative session, the Governor of Tennessee introduced a workers’ compensation reformation bill, which just totally gutted the system and screwed the Tennessee worker. I fought…
Read MoreBreaking Out of Pain Management Prison: Brave Client Shares His Struggles With Addiction After Life-Altering Work Injury
Let’s imagine you’ve been injured at work or maybe it was in a bad car wreck or motorcycle accident. In a workers’ compensation case, once you’ve reached that plateau of recovery called Maximum Medical Improvement you are often released on an “as needed” basis by your orthopaedic surgeon or neurosurgeon. Sometimes injured workers don’t need…
Read MoreWhat are Interrogatories and How Am I Supposed to Answer Them?
Interrogatories- a legal instrument not to be taken lightly. When you think interrogatories, think interrogation on paper. Often served with your Complaint or shortly thereafter, they are a strategic set of questions designed to reveal more about the parties and facts involved in the case. Once all the other parties involved in your case file…
Read MoreIs Your Employer In Compliance With Tennessee’s New OSHA Reporting Rules?
OSHA (Occupational Safety & Health Administration) is a part of the United States Department of Labor and created by Congress to assure safe and healthy working conditions by setting standards and guidelines and providing information, training and assistance to workers and employees. To help accomplish this goal, the organization affords workers protections under the law without the retaliation or discrimination…
Read MoreComplex Workers’ Compensation Cases and Multiple On-the-Job Injuries- A Real Life Example
In the state of Tennessee, if a person has injured more than one part of their body during the same workplace accident, the calculation of permanent impairment benefits can get complicated. But, what if an individual suffers a serious injury which causes that person to overcompensate with another part of the body? If the overcompensated…
Read MoreCan I Trust My Nurse Case Manager?
In Tennessee, not every injured worker is going to interact with a nurse case manager, but many do. I can’t count the times a new client has expressed some concern about whose side the nurse case manager is on. I tell people to be careful who they trust, and remember who hired the nurse case…
Read MoreCan I sue my co-employee for negligence that caused my work injury?
Rocky McElhaney Law Firm has helped hundreds of workers who have been hurt on the job. The ways they have been hurt vary from a saw malfunctioning and cutting them, slipping on spilled liquids in a warehouse, to wrecks on the interstate. One common situation we’ve seen is that the worker is injured because a…
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