As I’ve written before, spinal cord pain stimulators treat chronic, excruciating pain. While workers’ compensation can pay for a pain stimulator, you can expect the workers’ compensation insurance company to fight hard against it due to the extreme expense.
Without a doubt, needing a spinal cord stimulator means you’ve suffered a severe, often disabling injury. So, it should be a slam-dunk to qualify for maximum workers’ compensation financial settlements like workers’ compensation permanent and total disability or wage loss, right?
Wrong! South Carolina’s workers’ compensation law can work against you here, which is why you need legal protection to get the most benefits for your spinal cord stimulator case. Find out how we can help protect your rights. It's easy, and can save you a lot of unnecessary heartache you don't need to live with. Get your questions answered in a free, no pressure strategy session with a Spartanburg, SC workers’ comp attorney. Call toll free at 888-230-1841 or fill out a Get Help Now form.
Why Maximum Benefits Can Be Denied Despite a Pain Stimulator
There are only five ways to qualify for workers’ compensation totally disabled benefits:
- You lose over 50% of your back. The South Carolina Court of Appeals ruled a spinal cord stimulator doesn’t injure your back, as I’ll show you in a minute.
- Total loss of both hands, arms, feet, legs, eyes, or a combination of any two. A pain stimulator usually doesn’t involve this.
- Paralysis.
- Physical brain damage.
- Injuring two body parts that strip you of all job skills. This is South Carolina’s harsh two-injury rule.
Many pain stimulator cases come down to this two-injury rule that can force you out of maximum workers’ compensation settlements. This is best shown by a 2013 South Carolina Court of Appeals decision called Colonna v Marlboro Park Hospital. In that case, a geriatric nurse slipped on a wet floor at the hospital, injuring her right ankle and foot. She eventually required a spinal cord pain stimulator.
The Court of Appeals ruled she failed to qualify for the maximum financial benefits under the two-injury rule. The Court ruled she proved only an injury to a single body part, her leg. Because she failed to prove another body part was impaired, injured, or suffered disability, she was blocked from additional benefits. The Court ruled the spinal cord stimulator didn’t cause any injury to her back or spine. So, despite an injury giving her lifelong, agonizing pain, Colonna was limited to a settlement for a single body part.
How a Workers’ Compensation Attorney Can Help With a Spinal Cord Stimulator Case
If you’re seriously hurt, there are many reasons to hire a workers’ compensation attorney. It’s especially critical in a pain stimulator case:
- The insurance company will fight hard to protect their money, and the law is potentially against you already. You need a professional to fight for you. The first fight will likely be whether you can even get the pain stimulator. For the insurance company, it’s way cheaper to force you to suffer.
- A creative, hardworking attorney can give you the best shot at a maximum financial settlement. I’ve overcome the dreaded two-injury rule in a spinal cord stimulator case. I’ve even shocked the insurance company with a solid two-injury rule argument they never saw coming. I've helped a client get a good pain stimulator settlement from a brutally tightfisted insurance company that denied a lumbar spinal disk herniation surgery.
Take the First Simple Step to Help Us Help You
You’ve got so much to lose. You need the help of an experienced Spartanburg workers’ compensation attorney.
When you need a pain stimulator, nothing’s easy. That’s why we give several ways to contact us to get your questions answered. Call toll-free at 888-230-1841 or fill out a Get Help Now form. Because this is a huge decision, you should scout us out—check out the reviews we don’t script or edit on a website we don’t own.
And for more info on how South Carolina workers’ compensation cases work, download our FREE BOOK on workers' comp cases.
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