By Lee Dryden
BridgeTower Media Newswires
DETROIT—Summary disposition was granted to the defendant after a car accident as a split Michigan Court of Appeals panel decided that a plaintiff’s “myriad of maladies” was unrelated to the crash.
In Lingenfelter v. Farm Bureau General Insurance Company, the majority affirmed the Monroe County Circuit Court. The plaintiff, who has an “extensive medical history of chronic and degenerative problems dating back years before the May 2016 motor vehicle accident,” claimed that she suffered injuries in the crash resulting in a serious impairment of a body function.
The unpublished per curiam opinion was issued by Chief Judge Christopher M. Murray and Judge Michael J. Riordan.
Judge Kathleen Jansen dissented, stating that the plaintiff has “established the existence of genuine issues of material fact regarding whether an objectively manifested impairment of an important body function affected her ability to live her normal life.”
The case
On May 6, 2016, plaintiff Helen Faye Lingenfelter, a 75-year-old retiree, was involved in an accident while seated in the front seat of a car driven by her fiancé, Yule Williams. Defendant Betty Krieger ran a red light and hit Williams’ vehicle on the front passenger side, according to the COA opinion.
An ambulance transported the plaintiff to the hospital but she was discharged after a half-hour because her CT scans and X-rays indicated no fractures or bleeding.
A month after the accident, the plaintiff met with her primary care physician, Dr. Rodney Gilreath, who indicated that her right back pain was chronic. He did not diagnose her with any new conditions but referred her to physical therapy.
“Plaintiff contends that due to the accident, she now suffers from a retracted long head tear of the biceps tendon in her right shoulder, multiple disc bulges and protrusions with areas of nerve root impingement in her spine, a compression fracture in her spine, bruising, and tendinosis or tendinitis in her right shoulder,” the opinion stated. “However, plaintiff’s post-accident complaints of pain and suffering mirror her preaccident complaints.”
For example, she complained of back pain as early as 2000 and she had neck fusion surgery in 2001, but still complained of neck problems the following year, according to the opinion. She again complained of chronic back pain in 2013 and had a total left knee replacement in 2015.
The opinion stated that four independent medical evaluations by “physicians in separate fields and specialties concluded that plaintiff was not disabled and that her symptoms were not caused by the accident.”
COA analysis
The majority stated that the only evidence that might support the plaintiff’s position is Gilreath’s “Attending Physician’s Report” and “Disability Certificate” as he checked “yes” in response to a question about whether the symptoms and diagnosis are a result of the accident. The diagnosis was traumatic injury to multiple areas, including plaintiff’s back and extremities.
“He noted plaintiff’s past surgery, but indicated that she had increased pain since the accident. He marked plaintiff as disabled from the date of the accident to present, and signed a disability certificate which indicated that plaintiff was disabled from housework from the date of the accident to present,” the opinion stated.
“However, these documents were not signed until March 2018, and are contradicted by Dr. Gilreath’s prior, post-accident diagnosis of plaintiff’s back pain, which described the pain as chronic, as opposed to traumatic.”
The majority agreed with the trial court that the plaintiff “had restrictions before the accident, and her restrictions were ‘about the same’ after the accident.”
“Plaintiff asserted that she was fully independent before the accident and she continued to live alone after the accident. Plaintiff testified that she liked to cook and bake before the accident, but after, she could not stand up long enough to do so, and she could not walk farther than two blocks at a time,” the opinion stated. “However, plaintiff made similar complaints before the accident when she requested a handicapped parking sticker in February 2013, and again in August 2013.”
“Plaintiff’s testimony that she was able to do many tasks before the accident is contradicted by her medical history. Significant objective evidence demonstrated that, before this accident, plaintiff suffered from several chronic conditions, and led a sedentary lifestyle. She had numerous preexisting conditions, including degenerative spine, knee, and ankle issues, and diabetes.”
Outpatient rehabilitation medical records include a long list of common tasks that she has difficulty with or can no longer perform, but the majority says evidence shows that “these are the same things she had difficulty doing before the accident.”
“Clearly plaintiff suffers from a myriad of maladies. However, she fails to show that any of them arose from, or were aggravated or exacerbated by the accident. Neither can she demonstrate that her general ability to lead her preaccident, normal life has been affected. Therefore, the trial court properly granted defendant’s motion for summary disposition,” the opinion stated.
Dissent
Jansen cited Gilreath’s signing of the disability certificate dating back to the accident, disabling the plaintiff from housework.
“Plaintiff testified that she hurt her knees in the accident, and had trouble walking thereafter, even on the knee that she had replaced before the accident. Plaintiff complained of headaches before the accident, but she testified that she experienced pain in her head every day after the accident,” Jansen wrote. “Although there was little record evidence of a physical basis for her complaints, there was conflicting evidence that the accident specifically exacerbated her preexisting chronic problems.
“Dr. Gilreath indicated that it did, and several of the independent medical examiners could not exclude the possibility that the accident exacerbated plaintiff’s problems. Therefore, the trial court erred in determining that plaintiff had no objectively manifested impairment of a body function.”
The plaintiff testified regarding the many tasks that she could no longer complete after the accident, and the outpatient rehabilitation report indicated many tasks that plaintiff “had trouble doing, or could no longer do,” Jansen wrote.
“In comparing plaintiff’s life before and after the accident, there is at least a question of fact whether any of plaintiff’s impairments influenced her normal manner of living,” Jansen wrote, adding that she would reverse the trial court and remand for further proceedings.
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