Minnesota workers often suffer from neck and back pain caused by work activities. But most of the time, these injuries occur while actually on the employer’s premises.
In the past, it was rare to see at-home workers filing a Minnesota workers’ compensation claim. It certainly happened, but not very often.
With the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic and so many employees working at home nowadays, there has been a significant increase in the number of at-home work injuries.
Many employees want to know if they can pursue a workers’ comp claim when sitting all day at work causes back and neck pain. The answer is, yes.
But these cases are difficult to win. The causation evidence has to be rock solid. If you are suffering from neck and back pain from working at home, you need strong representation.
You need a law firm that has decades of experience in representing injured Minnesota workers.
Are You an Employee or Independent Contractor?
One of the first questions that you have to answer is, What is your employment status? If you are a regular employee, your employer’s workers’ comp insurance covers work-related injuries.
But if you are an independent contractor, you are not covered for any work-related injuries. It does not matter how serious your injury is. If you are an independent contractor, you can’t get workers’ comp benefits from the company you are performing work for.
You would have to get your medical bills paid some other way. Even if your employer claims you are an independent contractor, it is a good idea to speak to a workers’ compensation attorney about your injury.
Employers sometimes misclassify employees as independent contractors. An attorney can help you determine whether you might still have a workers’ compensation claim.
What Is a Minnesota Work Injury?
Almost all Minnesota employees who suffer an injury while working are entitled to workers’ comp benefits. This means that if you are on the clock and suffer injury, you probably have a valid workers’ comp claim.
Workers’ comp does not consider a fault. You could have caused the accident yourself by being careless. If so, it’s still covered. The only time it wouldn’t be covered is if you were horsing around or off the clock.
It also doesn’t matter whether you work at your employer’s premises or at home. As long as you demonstrate that you are on the clock and work activities caused your injuries, you’ll be covered by workers’ comp insurance.
Obviously, though, at-home work injuries are more complicated because usually there are no witnesses to whatever event caused the injury.
How Can You Prove an at-Home Work Injury Causing Neck and Back Pain?
There are many ways to demonstrate that the neck and back pain you are experiencing is because of work activities at home.
It could be an obvious work injury, such as taking a break from work to get a cup of coffee and falling down the stairs. Minnesota courts deemed this factual scenario to be a work-related injury and covered by workers’ comp.
At-home work injuries can also develop over time due to repetitive stress on your body. For example, if you are sitting all day at work, back and neck pain could develop as a result.
One of the issues that the pandemic has created is workers having to work from home for the first time in large numbers.
Your at-home work environment might not be as ergonomically safe as it was at your place of employment. Medical experts state that the human body is not designed to sit still, slumped over a computer screen for eight to ten hours a day.
Workers can develop neck and back pain if they aren’t used to sitting a certain way for long periods of time. The difficult part of these cases is establishing through expert medical testimony that the at-home work environment is what caused the neck and back pain.
The claimant’s treating medical doctor has to issue an opinion that there was no other potential cause of the injury and that it was caused by work activities or the work environment.
Once you meet this burden, you have a fighting chance to win your workers’ compensation claim. But you can’t do it alone.
You will want to turn to an experienced workers’ compensation lawyer like those at Arechigo & Stokka, who have focused their practice on workers’ comp cases for over a decade.
The Minnesota Workers’ Comp Lawyers at Arechigo & Stokka Can Fight for Your St. Paul Workers’ Compensation Benefits
This past year-and-a-half has been pretty strange for many Minnesota workers. So many employees had to work from home and still do.
If you believe you have suffered from an at-home work injury, you need to have skilled and knowledgeable lawyers fighting for your rights to receive workers’ compensation benefits.
These benefits include both the payment of medical bills and lost wages. We have decades of Minnesota workers’ compensation experience in successfully representing hundreds of claimants.
Contact us online or call Arechigo & Stokka at 651-505-5943 to learn more about the services we provide to injured workers in Minnesota.
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