What Are the Most Common Workplace Injuries Covered by Minnesota Workers’ Comp Laws?

If you’ve been injured on the job here in Minnesota, Minnesota’s worker’s compensation laws are there to protect you. Like most law, however, worker’s comp law can be very technical and difficult to understand. And even if you fully understand it, it can be a bit of a nightmare trying to defend your rights within it and ensure that you get compensation for what you’re owed. Talk to a work injury lawyer in Minneapolis as soon as possible to get the details you need for your situation.

Most Common Workplace Injuries Covered by Minnesota Workers’ Comp Laws

There are three broad types of injuries that worker’s comp covers: physical injury, occupational illness or injury, and mental or emotional stress. Physical injuries that happen at the workplace or during work-mandated travel are typically (though not always) the simplest and easiest to get compensation for. Occupational injuries can be a bit more difficult, and the strictest rules surround mental or emotional injury. Let’s go over the types and some examples.

Physical Injuries

The most common physical injuries that are suffered by workers in Minnesota and covered by worker’s compensation are broken bones, wounds, sprains, muscle strain, and contusions and concussions. Contusions, on much of the body, manifest as bruises and are caused by a blow of some kind. When that blow lands on the head, sometimes a concussion is the result.

Workers are commonly injured doing things like moving heavy boxes, falling in slippery areas, or having something fall on them. Another common source of injury are vehicle accidents of some kind, whether these are motor vehicles out on the road or a vehicle in use at a workplace.

Qualifying for Worker’s Comp

To qualify for workers compensation, a physical injury has to reach a certain level of severity. The law does not try to lay down any precise definitions here, but it does look for certain hallmarks. For example, if your injury could be easily treated with first aid, it will probably not qualify. If you had to go to urgent care or the emergency room, it’s much more likely you’ll be covered. A compensable injury should also cause you to miss time from work, at least on the day of the injury itself. And of course, if an injury causes you any kind of permanent impairment or physical damage, that would be considered a compensable and serious injury.

As you can imagine, the threshold is sometimes slightly confusing. Ankle sprains are really quite common, for example, and in the end it comes down to just how severe the sprain was. If some ice and an over-the-counter wrap, plus a little bit of rest, are all that’s needed, and your employer was able to give you work to do that didn’t require you to be on your feet so that you didn’t really miss much work, worker’s comp is unlikely to apply. A more severe sprain that greatly compromises your ability to move, and especially if that severe sprain keeps you from being able to work at all, would probably be covered.

Travel injuries are a special category here. Any injuries you suffer during your normal commute from home to your regular workplace are not covered by worker’s comp, but if you are required to do travel specifically for your employer, you would be covered for any injuries you sustained during that travel. The key is being able to prove that you were doing required company travel at the time.

Occupational Illness and Injury

Your injury does not have to happen in a single accident at one point in time for it to be covered. Worker’s compensation also covers a number of injuries and illnesses that are considered “occupational hazards.” These are any diseases or injuries that result from dangers in the workplace or the nature of your work. For example, carpal tunnel syndrome is a common occupational illness for those who have to do repetitive work on the computer. Hearing loss from loud working environments is another common occupational injury.

Some of the more severe occupational injuries are thankfully less common, but they do sometimes occur. Some people develop skin diseases from exposure to chemicals, while others can develop lung diseases from certain airborne hazards in their workplace. Occupational illnesses can sometimes be more difficult to prove than physical injuries.

Qualifying for Worker’s Comp

The key here is being able to show that your occupational injury or illness was caused primarily by work and not by any other factor. For example, if you work at a computer all day for your company, but you also spend your evenings and weekends doing a side hustle on the computer, like freelance writing or coding, it may become difficult to claim carpal tunnel compensation than it would if the only time you spent at the computer was for work.

Mental or Emotional Stress/Illness

Minnesota law recognizes that mental trauma can happen in the workplace and should be compensated for. However, it is much harder to qualify for compensation. This is because it’s harder to “prove” not only the existence of the mental trauma, but also it’s extent. Not only that, but people have different reactions to different types of stress.

Something that might cause PTSD in one person and result in deep depression and anxiety over time could cause another person just to experience a few weeks of minor anxiety that they don’t perceive as overly difficult to deal with. The first person may only be able to recover after getting professional help, while the second person might be able to get over it by going on a vacation. These differences are just part of being human and not a reflection of character or mental strength. Things just affect us in different ways.

Qualifying for Worker’s Comp

For Minnesota workers compensation, the key is first showing there has been real mental injury, and then proving that the mental injury was caused by an “out of the ordinary” event or by work stress that was beyond what is normal and expected for the job. Unfortunately, this means that just being overworked and feeling unhappy doesn’t qualify; the reality is that most people feel overworked and often feel unhappy at their jobs. This is just “normal human life.”

However, if there’s a shooting at your workplace and someone is badly injured or even killed, this would certainly count as out-of-the-ordinary, and any mental illness that you develop afterward, such as PTSD, is probably compensable.

Talk to a Work Injury Lawyer in Minneapolis

As mentioned, the laws surrounding worker’s comp can be difficult to understand, and it can be hard to know whether your injury actually qualifies or precisely where the line is between a compensable and noncompensable injury. It’s also important that you have the right evidence to prove your injury and how it happened and be able to make a good case for why your injury qualifies. A work injury lawyer knows the rules inside and out and will be able to help you understand your situation and present the evidence in a compelling way.

If you’ve been injured on the workplace, contact us today in our Minneapolis or Saint Paul offices at the Atkinson Gerber Law Office.