Reporting Workers Compensation Injuries

Your employer is responsible for your injury when it is caused by accident or occupational disease, arising out of and in the course your job.  You are then entitled to compensation therefor from your employer as long as you were not willfully negligent at the time of receiving the injury.  Neb. Rev. Stat. 48-101.

Many employees are injured while working. Sometimes that is a sudden and obvious injury. In other situations the constant repetitive motions of your job (like chopping and turning out fry baskets, straining to reach things, and carrying boxes out of the freezers) can cause pain and injury.

If you are injured on the job in Nebraska, you do need to report it to your employer immediately. Your employer must then contact their Workers' Compensation insurance company. Some employers require that you go to the company doctor when you report an injury. The law says that the employer can have a  periodic evaluation by a doctor of their choosing but that's only for an evaluation. You have the right to be treated by any doctor who treated you in the past or who's office maintains medical records. Any clinic or hospital you have been to should qualify. You can also be treated by any doctor who has treated or who's office maintains medical records for your spouse, parents, children & step children. When you tell your employer you are hurt, it is best if you have the name and address you your doctor in hand. The employer may ask you to sign a form 50 which can give you the right to see your own doctor or take that right away,  epending on the box you check. Read everything you are asked to sign and if the employer already checked the box saying that you would see the company doctor, ask for a new form. Also keep a copy of anything you are asked to sign.

As the employee, you also should inform your treating physician that you have suffered a work-related injury so that the doctor may comply with the statutory requirement to file a first treatment medical report with the employer/insurer. You also should submit charges for medical treatment to the employer/insurer so that they can be promptly paid.

The First Report of Injury form is available here http://www.wcc.ne.gov/publications/form1.pdf

Rights and information sheet from the Nebraska Workers' Compensation Court is available here.

If you have been injured at work and want to file for Workers' Compensation Benefits, you should consider contacting Angela Madathil.  Madathil Law Office specializes in employment and Workers' Compensation law in Nebraska, and offers free consultations.   

Madathil Law office serves Nebraska Workers' Compensation clients in Omaha, Lincoln, Lancaster County, Douglas County, Otoe, and Cass County Nebraska.  If need a Nebraska Workers' Compensation lawyer, consider contacting Angela Y. Madathil and the Madathil Law Firm.  

Contact us at angela@madathil-law.com or by telephone at 402.577.0686.  The firm offers free consultations.  For more information feel free to look at our website www.madathil-law.com.

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