Montgomery County CRPS/RSD Lawyer

When you get injured at work, Workers’ Compensation should be able to cover any acute injuries as well as the ongoing disability care needed for the resulting symptoms.  When those symptoms include mysterious pain and sensitivity beyond what is normal for the specific injury, it is possible you might have CRPS, and your employer’s Workers’ Comp carrier might not want to cover you.

Our attorneys can fight to show the insurance carrier that your condition is real and that it is linked to your work injury, potentially getting coverage for all medical care, imaging, medication, therapy, and other care to treat your CRPS or RSD.  We can also fight to get you ongoing wage-loss benefits if your CRPS keeps you from being able to work going forward.

Call Cardamone Law at (267) 651-7945 today for a free review of your case with our Montgomery County workers compensation lawyers.

Challenges of Applying for Workers’ Comp with CRPS in MontCo, PA

In most work injury cases that result in ongoing pain and discomfort that gets in the way of working and requires ongoing therapy and medical care, you should be entitled to ongoing coverage for your care and lost wages.  However, CRPS often runs into complications that make it harder to get Workers’ Comp for CRPS, mainly for these three reasons:

They Don’t Believe You

CRPS is hard to identify with imaging and nerve testing.  As such, doctors – especially the ones that work for Workers’ Comp carriers – are often unlikely to believe that you have CRPS and do all of the extra testing at the Workers’ Comp carrier’s expense to confirm your condition.  The link between an injury and the pain that CRPS produces is often a mismatch, and doctors are quick to call this condition merely psychosomatic or even accuse you of overreacting.

It can take time, repeat appointments, and even begging to get your doctor to run tests, and getting them to believe that you have CRPS in the first place is one big challenge to getting it covered.

Linking CRPS to Your Injury

CRPS can be difficult to link to your injury because there is often no clear evidence that you have CRPS, let alone an observable connection to your injury.  CRPS stands for complex regional pain syndrome – also called regional sympathetic dystrophy syndrome (RSD or RSDS).  As the name implies, there is often a broad area affected, and while your injury might have been to the same area, that is not always enough for a doctor to confidently state that the specific injury to that area was what caused the broader CRPS symptoms.

For type 1 CRPS, where there is no recognized nerve damage, it can be hard to track your CRPS’ direct cause.  With type 2 CRPS, there is identifiable nerve damage, so we can much more easily show your doctors and insurance carriers that the injury – and its nerve damage – is what is causing your CRPS.

It often takes the tests and imaging discussed above – the ones that doctors are reluctant to perform – to prove your CRPS is from your initial work injury.

Expense

Our Certified Pennsylvania Workers’ Compensation Specialists see denials for all kinds of conditions on potentially dubious grounds.  Workers’ Comp carriers often try to deny claims for expensive conditions, given that it would be easier for them if they did not have to pay for all that extra treatment.  However, the truth often comes out, and medical evidence can be presented in court to help force the Workers’ Comp carrier to cover your condition once we get the scans and tests to prove you have CRPS/RSD.

Workers’ Comp should pay for all testing and diagnostics as well as ongoing care needs, like medication, physical therapy, and more.  In many cases, things like chiropractic care and acupuncture are routinely covered by Workers’ Comp as well.

How to Identify CRPS After a Work Injury in Montgomery County, PA

CRPS most often appears with a work injury in the aftermath of your initial injury.  Something like a broken bone is often a common impetus for CRPS, where the pain of the break goes away, but additional CRPS pain remains.

An initial injury usually has a sharp pain, but the aftermath – especially for a broken bone – often has a “dull” or “achey” pain.  CRPS is usually associated with a “sharp” pain, potentially even at just a slight touch to the area.  This pain could also be accompanied by sensitivity to temperature, pins-and-needles sensations, and other symptoms similar to what you might expect with nerve injuries.

There are also physical signs of CRPS/RSD, which can go a long way toward proving that the condition is not mental or psychosomatic.  For example, there are often changes in the color and texture of the skin and the hair on that part of the body.  If your hand or foot is affected, you may also see changes in nail growth or texture as well as changes in sweating.

Stiffness, changes in the bones or tendons, and changes to your muscles are often common.  CRPS in an arm or leg might come with changes to how you move, weakness, and even potential jerks and tremors.

If you are healing up from a work injury and discover any of these sensations or symptoms and they seem odd for your injury, talk to your doctor about the potential for a possible CRPS diagnosis.  If your doctor gives you a hard time, consider talking to our attorneys about the condition and the doctor’s denials.

Can You Get Wage-Loss Benefits for CRPS

Any work-related injury that keeps you from returning to work at your previous capacity can result in wage-loss benefits to cover around 2/3 of your lost wages.  This should be available for CRPS if the condition keeps you from working.  In many cases, workers are so bothered by constant pain and discomfort that they cannot work.  Especially if the injury does come with ongoing muscle weakness, your physical ability to work might also be impaired, resulting in provable lost earning capacity.

Call Our CRPS/RSD Attorneys in Montgomery County Today

For a free case assessment, contact Cardamone Law’s Norristown workers compensation lawyers at (267) 651-7945 today.