Canadian Safety Reporter

3 Former cop's PTSD and depression make him unemployable: Tribunal Existing depression and psychological issues worsened after accident while trying to make arrest BY JEFFREY R. SMITH A FORMER ONTARIO police officer is entitled to full loss of earnings benefits from psycho- logical and physical injuries he suffered while attempting an arrest, the Ontario Workplace Safety and Insurance Appeals Tribunal has ruled. The now 54-year-old-worker was a police officer when he was trying to make an arrest on Oct. 7, 2002. In the process of at- tempting the arrest, the officer was hit by a car, resulting in a shoulder injury. Before the incident, the officer had issues with his lower back due to a work-related injury. He had to take time off work be- cause of the injury and, during his medical leave, began to suffer from depression. The depres- sion may also have been related to conflict issues he had at work, and he received psychological treatment for it. Following the incident, the officer was diagnosed with a psychological impairment that included post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) and depres- sion. Combined with the shoul- der impairment, the officer was given a 38 per cent non-econom- ic loss award. He didn't receive any compensation for possible aggravation of his back injury. PTSD and depression became too much for worker The officer eventually returned to work with modified duties. He then went off work again in 2004 and didn't return. He was hospi- talized twice over the next few years for psychological reasons. The Ontario Workplace Safety and Insurance Board (WSIB) re- ferred the former officer for la- bour market re-entry (LMR) ser- vices in 2008. However, the LMR service provider initially recom- mended that no plan be imple- mented because it couldn't iden- tify any suitable employment for him. The WSIB asked again and eventually it was determined that the worker could find suitable employment as a public health inspector. However, he was un- able to complete the plan and it was terminated in August 2010. After more investigation, it was decided the worker was capable of working as a night watchman. His loss-of-earnings benefits were calculated according to the pay rate of a night watchman. The worker disputed this determina- tion but his appeal was denied. The worker appealed once again, this time to the tribunal, arguing his PTSD and depres- sion made him unemployable. The accident employer, his for- mer police service, acknowl- edged that the position of night watchman was likely unsuitable for the worker, but insisted he was capable of employment in some other position. The tribunal noted there was medical evidence indicating the worker was incapable of em- ployment but also capable of some employment. The worker's shoulder impairment didn't pre- vent him from working in some capacity, as he had "significant intellectual capacity and is quite articulate," said the tribunal. The main question was how limiting his psychological issues were. The tribunal found that while the worker had some physical ca- pability, he was "psychologically fragile" because of his PTSD and depression. The worker had pre-existing depression and his workplace accident ramped it up to PTSD, leading to anxiety and "emotional vulnerability and volatility that would not easily be tolerated in most workplaces," said the tribunal. Worker was off work for years before return-to-work attempts The tribunal also found that the length of time that elapsed be- tween the workplace accident and the LMR plan — six years, with more than four years since the worker last worked — hin- dered the chance of the plan's success. Psychological evalua- tions over the years indicated the worker was capable of a return to work, but as a transitional re-en- try with psychological support. The worker was incapable of this without WSIB assistance and was therefore not employable on his own once his LMR plan was terminated in 2010. Further, psychological evalua- tions revealed physical and emo- tional abuse in the worker's past, which compounded his work- place conflict problems and injury-related depression. The worker struggled with personal relationships and had to disen- gage from life to deal with the physical and emotional pain he suffered. This seriously hindered his ability to integrate back into a workplace, said the tribunal. Any reports that were opti- mistic about the worker's abil- ity to return to work came with cautions that he stay away from "high risk capacity with poten- tial re-exposure to trauma" along with psychological treatment. This effectively ruled out the po- sitions of public health inspector and night watchman as potential return-to-work opportunities. The tribunal noted that delays in returning to work and rehabili- tation treatment had "a strongly negative effect" on a successful return to work. The substantial delays in the worker receiving re- habilitation services a and return- to-work plan — during which the worker was hospitalized more than once for his psychological problems — made his prospects for returning to work much dim- mer, said the tribunal. Even then, his initial LMR plan found no suitable employment for him because of his issues. Only after the WSIB pressed further, did a position come up — a position that could have resulted in stress- ful situations if the worker was enforcing public health require- ments, said the tribunal. The position of night watch- man could have led to stressful situations as well, and any work dealing with the public or a team of co-workers wouldn't jibe well with the worker's solitary ten- dencies and emotional prob- lems, said the tribunal. The tribunal found the worker was incapable of employment as a result of his psychological injuries suffered on the job and granted him full loss-of-earn- ings benefits until he turned 65. For more information see: • Decision No. 589/16, 2016 Car- swellOnt 5334 (Ont. W.S.I.A. Trib.). Canadian HR Reporter, a Thomson Reuters business 2016 News | June 2016 | CSR Credit: Anton Prado PHOTO (Shutterstock)

• Cover