Compensation For Shoulder Injuries In The Workplace

If you work in manual labor, your shoulders absorb a lot of stress on a daily basis. If you’re active when you’re not at work, they also absorb a lot of stress during recreational time. Because shoulders are so often stressed in and out of work, insurance companies can be quick to deny a shoulder injury claim under the assumption that the injury was not directly related to work duties. Below, we take a closer look at shoulder injuries in the workplace, and how to ensure you receive the maximum compensation for your shoulder injury.

Frozen Shoulder Injuries At Work

Shoulder injuries are very common in the workplace, but they often occur when lifting heavy objects, especially if you have to lift them over your head, and when a falling person extends their arms to try and brace for impact. Not only are they common, but they can also be severe. A recent review of shoulder injuries in the workplace found that shoulder injuries caused workers to miss an average of 26 days from work, more time than from injuries to any other body part.

One of the more common shoulder injuries in the workplace is called adhesive capsulitis, or frozen shoulder. It’s a painful condition that limits motion of the shoulder joint in all directions, and recovery can take a while. The injury has three common stages:

Freezing, where the joint begins to gradually get stiffer.
Frozen, where joint movement is almost impossible.
Thawing, where gradual movement begins to return to the shoulder joint.

It is not uncommon for these stages to take weeks and months, so it’s not something that’s going to go away very quickly. Also, since it can happen slowly over time, many workers don’t report the injury until it gets more severe, and there doesn’t always exist a “moment of injury,” it just happens over time.

Getting Compensation For Shoulder Injuries

As we noted above, because of their injury pathway and how regularly we use our shoulders outside of work, it’s pretty common for insurance companies to deny your shoulder injury claim. Oftentimes they’ll say the injury was caused by a pre-existing condition, or that you actually injured it outside of work.

Whether you’ve been denied or you face the prospect of filing a shoulder injury claim, make sure your first call is to a workers’ compensation lawyer like Dean Margolis. Since the rehab timeline can keep you out of work for a long time, it’s important to maximize your claim and ensure all relevant medical costs are covered. Some individuals respond best to shoulder injections and physical therapy, while others are best treated with surgery, which is why it is also important to get a comprehensive medical examination from a trusted physician. Our lawyers can help refer you to a trusted doctor in your area.

Don’t get bullied by your employer’s insurance company if you believe that your shoulder injury arose out of work duties. Talk to an attorney and let us handle all the paperwork while you focus solely on rehabbing your injury. For more information on how we’ll work closely with you to get you the workers’ compensation benefits that you deserve, reach out to Margolis Law Office today.