A decision of the Iowa Court of Appeals that was filed in August of 2008 has now been published. While much of the decision is routine, one portion of the decision is interesting.

In Dodd v. Fleetguard, 759 N.W.2d 133 (Iowa Ct. App. 2008), the Iowa Court of Appeals held that a claimant does not have to prove a compensable injury to establish that the employer must pay for an Independent Medical Examination under section 85.39 of the Iowa Code. Under Iowa law, if an employer chooses the medical care and obtains an impairment rating, the claimant is entitled to an IME at the employer’s expense. Traditionally, attorneys and Courts have thought of the IME as only being available where there is an established work injury. In fact, in proceedings before the Iowa Division of Workers’ Compensation, any claimant’s application for an IME would be dismissed without a hearing, if the employer denied liability for the injury.

However, in Dodd v. Fleetguard, the Iowa Court of Appeals pointed out that section 85.39 of the Iowa Code provides no such requirement to prove a compensable injury. Citing an earlier decision of the Iowa Supreme Court, IBP v. Harker, 633 N.W.2d 322 (Iowa 2001), the Court of Appeals pointed out that  the Iowa Supreme Court found no such requirement of a work injury, for the employer to be ordered to pay for an IME under section 85.39.

There has been virtually no discussion of this decision, but if the Dodd decision is applied as it reads, if an employer sends a claimant to a doctor for an opinion on compensability, and the doctor says that there is no work injury, the claimant can ask for an IME, and should get one paid by the employer or carrier.

I talked to Dodd’s claimant’s attorney, and he confirmed that he argued that a claimant did not have to show a work injury to show entitlement to an IME. That is just what the Iowa Court of Appeals decided, and this is a new tool for a claimant’s attorney to obtain a  medical evaluation to level the playing field in work injury litigation.

UPDATE: Last week I cited the Dodd case in a request for an Independent Medical Examination(IME), under section 85.39 of the Iowa Code, where the carrier provided treatment and obtained a zero impairment from the treating doctor. We asked for an IME, whereupon the defendants denied that this was even a work injury. Up until Dodd, the agency would have simply dismissed our request for a second opinion on impairment rating. However, citing Dodd, the agency ordered the defendants to pay for the IME.

Further, under Iowa law the employer and carrier can direct the treatment, unless they deny that it is a work injury. In this case, they have now denied that this is a work injury, so the claimant can go to a physician of his choice, under his excellent private health insurance coverage, and the carrier has no control over the  care. Since the workers’ compensation carrier has now denied compensability, the private carrier has to pay for the care. If we win at hearing, the employer has to reimburse the private health insurance carrier for the medical care provided from now on.

This is a new power tool that a claimant’s attorney can carry in his or her tool belt. It will be extremely useful in more cases than might have been thought when it came out.