Maryland employees who are injured in a workplace accident may be eligible for workers’ compensation benefits through their employer. The coverage they receive, however, may be contingent on several details surrounding the workplace incident. There are some situations where an employee could get coverage for a pre-existing condition if an on-the-job accident aggravated that condition. At McGowan & Cecil, LLC., we understand that sometimes pre-existing conditions may also interfere with an employee’s ability to receive compensation for his or her injury. This may be true even if the workers’ injury occurred while he or she was on-the-clock. Injured employees should understand how pre-existing conditions could affect their workers’ compensation coverage.
A pre-existing condition or injury is one that was present before the workplace accident occurred. If the condition was due to the ongoing performance of occupational tasks, the employee may be able to receive workers’ compensation benefits for aggravation of the injury. For example, if a worker had a previous back injury that he or she received from repetitive heavy lifting and then injured his or her back again, it could be considered a covered benefit.
If the pre-existing condition was not work-related, however, the case could be more complicated. For instance, workers who had arthritis pain in their knees prior to working for the company, and then received a knee injury, may have difficulties receiving full workers’ comp benefits.
To learn more about how aggravating an injury may affect your workers’ compensation benefits, please visit our page on pre-existing conditions.