CASE NO. 104 CRD-5-81Workers’ Compensation Commission
MAY 13, 1983
The Claimant-Appellant was represented by D. Thomas Condon, Esq.
The Respondent-Appellee was represented by William C. Brown, Esq.
This Petition for Review from the November 10, 1981 Decision of the Commissioner for the Fifth District was argued on November 19, 1982 before a Compensation Review Division Panel consisting of Commissioners John Arcudi, Andrew Denuzze and Robin Waller.
John Arcudi, Chairman, Andrew Denuzze, Commissioner, Robin Waller, Commissioner
FINDING AND AWARD
1. Paragraph 1 of the Fifth District Commissioner’s Finding and Award is made Paragraph 1 of this Division’s Finding and Award.
2. For a period from February 1971 until August, 1971 Claimant worked in a narrow 18′ x 50′ foot corridor between two structures.
3. She and another employee, one Wolcan were engaged in taking shoes from shoe trees composed of a steel and aluminum alloy and throwing the shoes into a receptacle.
4. The walls of the small working space were corrugated steel and the floor was cement.
5. The shoes would often hit each other and also often fall to the floor.
6. As a result the area was noisy.
7 8. Paragraphs 3 4 of the Fifth District Commissioner’s Finding and Award are made paragraphs 7 8 of this Division’s Finding and Award.
9. The Claimant continued to work for the Respondent until 1975 in the packing room and the boot room.
10. Both the areas mentioned in paragraph 9 were noisy but not so noisy as the area worked in from February to August 1971.
11. Claimant’s hearing loss in 1978 was 16.5% binaurally according to one standard and 23.1% binaurally according to a new 1979 standard.
12. The Claimant offered evidence through Dr. Victor Gotay, a Waterbury Otolaryngologist that such an increase in binaural hearing loss between 1971 and 1978 was more probably than not due to continuous noise exposure over the years and not to an isolated noisy event such as attendance at a rock music concert.
13. Paragraph 6 of the Fifth District Commissioner’s Finding and Award is made paragraph 13 of this Division’s Finding and Award.
It is therefore ORDERED, ADJUDGED, AND DECREED that the Respondent.
A. Issue a Voluntary Agreement and pay the Claimant thereon the sum represented by the .5% binaural hearing loss;
B. Pay all related medical bills and expenses including Doctors Blain and Gotay;
C. Pay three hundred and fifty ($350.00) dollars to Doctor Gotay for his participation in Formal Hearing.
OPINION
Claimant was employed by Uniroyal at Naugatuck from 1954 to 1975. In 1971 she worked in a small noisy area, a narrow 18′ x 50′ foot corridor between two structures where she and another employee stripped shoes from metal shoe trees and threw them into receptacles. The walls of this narrow area were corrugated steel and the floor was cement. Shoes hitting each other or falling to the floor as they were thrown and the metal shoe trees all contributed to causing excessive noise. Claimant in the latter part of 1971 had a 0.5% binaural hearing loss attributable to her work.
After 1971 the areas of the factory where she worked were noisy but not so noisy as the narrow corridor previously described. By 1978 Claimant had suffered a much greater binaural hearing loss than that found in 1971, 16.5% by one standard or 23.1% by a more liberal 1979 rating standard adopted by the American Medical Association. Claimant sought to prove before the Commissioner that the additional hearing loss was due to her work at Uniroyal after 1971.
Claimant presented evidence through Dr. Victor Gotay, a Waterbury Otolaryngologist, that the increased hearing loss found in 1978 was more probably than not due to continuous noise exposure rather than a single noisy event. However, a careful examination of Dr. Gotay’s testimony given at Waterbury, January 24, 1980 fails to reveal any hypothetical question or any answer by the doctor that the work exposure between 1971 and 1975 was more probably than not the cause for the increased hearing loss.
It is true, as Claimant-Appellant’s counsel, argues that Dr. William Mancoll, a Respondent’s expert, testified that if it could be shown that Claimant was exposed to excessive work noise at Uniroyal after 1971, his opinion as to the cause of her increased 1978 loss might be different. However, such an opinion hardly satisfies the evidentiary quantum necessary for sustaining Claimant’s burden of proof that her increased hearing loss was due to noise exposure at work between 1971 and 1975. Certainly, it is not the kind of evidence which would permit us to substitute our findings for those of the Commissioner.
We have corrected the findings in part as requested since the Commissioner’s Finding. Paragraph 6, was factually inaccurate. In fact, Claimant had continued to work in Dept. 35 after 1971 but in another area. However, that inaccuracy did not affect the Commissioner’s basic conclusion that Claimant had failed to sustain her burden of proof with respect to the hearing loss after 1971.
The decision of the Commissioner is affirmed and the appeal is dismissed.