Workers’ Compensation

Firefighters who are injured on-the-job are entitled to work comp benefits. This includes volunteer, on-call, part-time, full-time, and career firefighters. Even if you work another non-firefighter job, you are still entitled to work comp, including wage loss benefits.

Work injuries include physical injuries, exposure illnesses, cancer, PTSD, heart conditions, and conditions that are aggravated or accelerated by a work-related injury.

Benefits

• Medical Benefits

  All reasonable and necessary medical care and treatment related to the injury for the rest of your life.

• Wage loss benefits

  Non-taxable benefits designed to keep the injured worker at the same pre-date of injury income. These include: temporary total disability, temporary partial disability, permanent total disability, and include permanent partial disability

• Rehabilitation benefits

  Services of a QRC (qualified rehabilitation consultant), retraining, job placement, medical management

• Permanent Partial Disability

  There is no pain and suffering in Worker’s Compensation. When the injury or illness causes functional disability, that is paid out to the firefighter or his family under most circumstances.

• Death and dependency benefits

  Wage loss benefits and flat rate funeral and death expenses to the decedent’s dependents. These numbers can be significant to those left behind.

What do I do if I’m injured on the job?

1. Report your injury. You absolutely need to report your injury to your department as soon as possible. Even if you don’t think it’s a big deal, even if you think you can tough it out till you have a few days off. If you don’t report it, the work comp insurer will treat it as if it never happened. A twinge in your shoulder, might turn out to be a torn rotator cuff that needs medical treatment. These are benefits to which you are entitled. You do not know if your injury will turn serious and you could miss weeks of wages, wages that you and your family count on.

2. Seek medical care. You need to document your injury. Seek treatment, whether you can only get in to your primary care doctor or a chiropractor, you need to seek treatment. If you don’t treat, again the insurer uses that as an excuse to deny benefits.

3. Make sure the insurer admits the injury. Your employer will complete an incident report according to the department’s policy. A First Report of Injury (“FROI”), should also be completed. This is official documentation that the employer and insurer must file with the Department of Labor and Industry (“DOLI”) that documents that this injury occurred. You should also receive a Notice of Primary Liability Determination or NPLD that is also filed with the State of Minnesota.

4. Call an attorney, if you have any questions, if you just don’t understand the paperwork, of if it’s denied. Give us a call. You aren’t bothering us and it’s better to prevent problems rather than try to untangle legal issues later down the road, which are preventable with early attorney intervention. You don’t know the rules of the game, but the insurance adjuster does. You might be assigned a QRC who isn’t employee friendly, you might not know you’re entitled to one, or you simply won’t be told. If you don’t fight a denial, you could forever lose your right to make a claim for benefits arising out of the injury.