After you sustained an injury, it is important that you obtain proper medical treatment and you provide your body an opportunity to heal. It is your doctor that will give you restrictions and limitations in an effort to allow you time to heal from your injury. Unfortunately, employers and insurers may try to rush you back to work too early and, you have a right to dispute it.
If you have been taken off work or placed on restrictions, you are not required to go back to work against your doctor’s recommendations. The insurance company may obtain an independent medical evaluation in an attempt to try to argue that you can go back to work either in a limited or full-duty capacity. The employer and insurer will then attempt to discontinue your wage loss benefits if you fail to return to work as they have requested. Under these circumstances, you have their ability to fight the discontinuance of benefits by requesting a conference. A workers’ compensation lawyer can assist you in representing you at a conference to stop the insurance company from discontinuing your wage loss benefits.
It is important to discuss with an attorney at any time that you have been offered employment as it can have a drastic effect on your wage loss benefits if you refuse employment. It is important to make sure that your doctor or physician believes that work offered by the employer and insurer is not truly within your restrictions or limitations. If the work is within your restrictions and limitations and your doctor believes that it is work that you can do, then it is possible that the work could be suitable gainful employment. In that case, if you did refuse the work, the employer and insurer would be allowed to discontinue your benefits. Consequently, it is very important that you have discussed these various scenarios with an attorney so you can make an informed decision.
