Superior Federal Savings & Loan Ass'n v. Shelby

George Rose Smith, Justice. This is a claim filed by the appellee for additional compensation under the workers’ compensation law. The employer and its insurance carrier resisted the claim on the ground that it was not filed within one year after the last payment of compensation and was therefore barred by limitations. Ark. Stat. Ann. § 81-1318 (b) (Repl. 1976). The Commission rejected the plea of limitations, finding that compensation had been furnished by the carrier to the claimant, in the form of medical treatments, within less than a year before the claim was filed. We find no substantial evidence to support that conclusion and therefore reverse the circuit court’s judgment affirming the award and dismiss the claim. The facts are not in dispute. Mrs. Shelby suffered a back injury in the course of her employment on February 14, 1975. She lost no time from work, but she was treated from time to time by Dr. Seubold, a chiropractor of her own choosing. On July 31, 1975, Dr. Seubold submitted a bill for $204, which was accompanied by a final report that the patient was asymptomatic and no longer under the doctor’s care. The carrier paid that bill on August 25, 1975. Dr. Seubold, also on August 25, realized that he had made a mistake in considering the case to be closed and directed his secretary to telephone the insurance carrier to keep the file open. In response to that call the carrier, on August 26, sent a printed questionnaire to Dr. Seubold, requesting a final report and asking for specific information, including this question: “Is the employee still under your treatment? Yes_No__” Dr. Seubold ignored the questionnaire and in fact did not communicate with the carrier for over 17 months. He did, however, continue to treat Mrs. Shelby. He sent his monthly bills to her and, when she expressed concern about their not having been paid, assured her that the insurance company would pay them. Finally, on February 8, 1977, Dr. Seubold submitted a bill for $405 to the carrier, for medical services consisting primarily of 42 spinal manipulations effected between July 28, 1975, and January 17, 1977. The Commission expressly found that Dr. Seubold was in error in waiting until February of 1977 to send his bill to the insurer, and the doctor testified himself that he had been at fault. The actual claim now in issue was not filed with the Commission until July 7, 1977. The Commission, in holding that the statute of limitations had not run, relied upon the carrier’s request, made on August 25, 1975, that Dr. Seubold file a final report. The Commission went on to say: “The requested final report was never filed, clearly indicating to all concerned that the claimant was still being treated by Dr. Seubold. Yet, the carrier, acting on the previously retracted ‘final report,’ purportedly ‘closed the file’ and now takes the position that they were unaware of continuing medical treatment at the hands of Dr. Seubold.” There is actually no testimony whatever that the carrier knew that Dr. Seubold was continuing to treat the claimant after the secretary’s telephone call on August 25, 1975. The carrier simply had no information one way or the other. The Commission’s reasoning, which puts the burden on the carrier to find out whether medical treatments are continuing, misconceives the nature of a statute of limitations. The burden is, rather, on the claimant to act within the time allowed. What we said in a similar situation in Phillips v. Bray, 234 Ark. 190, 351 S.W. 2d 147 (1961), is pertinent: No one can reasonably contend that a doctor could, by carelessness or connivance, keep the case in suspense for an unlimited time by merely failing to present his bill to the Commission. It seems perfectly obvious that the primary purpose of the one year statute of limitations is to give the claimant that much extra time to decide whether he has been fully compensated for his injury, and not for the purpose of paying belated medical bills. The one-year statute governing claims for additional compensation runs from the last “payment of compensation,” which we have held to mean the furnishing of medical services. Heflin v. Pepsi Cola Bottling Co., 244 Ark. 195, 424 S.W. 2d 365 (1968). Thus the Commission’s reasoning asserts that in this case the carrier was actually furnishing medical services to the claimant, even though the carrier had merely inquired whether the employee was still under treatment and had no actual knowledge that any medical services were being provided. As we said in Phillips v. Bray, supra, such an interpretation amounts to a nullification of the one-year statute of limitations. We conclude that the statute was permitted to run in the case at bar, not as a result of any action on the part of the carrier but solely as a result of the failure of the claimant or her doctor to file a claim within the time allowed. Reversed and dismissed. Hickman, J., concurs. Purtle, J., dissents.