Definition of Disability
A person is considered disabled when he/she has lost
the ability to earn wages because of an injury. Workers' compensation
does not pay weekly benefits for the injury itself or for pain; it
pays for the loss of the ability to earn wages caused by the injury,
i.e., the loss of earning capacity. There are two categories of
disability under the law – total disability and partial disability.
Total Disability
A person is considered totally disabled when he/she is
unable to earn any wages in any type of work due to the effects of the
work injury. A. totally disabled person is someone whose injury
prevents him/her from performing his/her regular job as well as any
other type of light work, i.e., a person who has a total loss of
earning capacity. Read full text of statute –
28-33-17(b)(1)
and (2).
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Partial Disability
A person is considered partially disabled when he/she
is unable to perform his/her regular job due to the effects of the
work injury but still has the ability to perform other types of light
work. It does not matter whether light work is available from the
employer. The determining factor is the ability to perform light work,
not the availability of light work.
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Odd Lot Doctrine
The law provides an exception to the above definitions
of total and partial
disability. Known as the odd lot doctrine, this law allows some
injured workers who are partially disabled to receive workers’
compensation for total disability. This law provides that an injured
worker who is partially disabled based solely on his/her work injury
may be considered totally disabled when he/she is unemployable because
of the injury combined with his/her age, education, background,
abilities and training. Under such circumstances, the Court may
consider such a person to be among the “odd lot” of unemployable
persons and, therefore, totally disabled.
Read full text of
statute
–
28-33-17(b)(2).
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