Illinois: Pulmonologist’s Testimony Fails Under Frye Evidence Standard

Claimant’s pulmonologist’s causation opinion was inadmissible under Frye and Ill. R. Evid. 702, where it was not based on a scientific methodology or principle that had gained general acceptance in the relevant scientific community. Claimant, an acknowledged smoker, contended that he had been exposed to a butter flavoring ingredient that contained the chemical diacetyl over a period of 20 years while working for the employer and that the exposure had caused pulmonary problems for him. His medical expert testified that a general causal connection existed between diacetyl exposure and lung disease, although the doctor admitted that CT scans of claimant’s lungs exhibited generalized emphysema in both lungs, a condition commonly seen in smokers. The expert also agreed that diacetyl was not a common cause of fixed obstructive lung disease and that the doctor had no knowledge regarding the levels of diacetyl to which the workers discussed in medical literature had been exposed nor whether they were exposed to the same product as claimant. His opinion amounted to speculation, said the court.

Thomas A. Robinson, J.D., the Feature National Columnist for the LexisNexis%20Workers’%20Compensation%20eNewsletter">LexisNexis Workers’ Compensation eNewsletter, is the co-author of Larson’s Workers’ Compensation Law (LexisNexis).

LexisNexis Online Subscribers: Citations below link to Lexis Advance.

See Durbin v. Illinois Workers’ Comp. Comm’n, 2016 IL App (4th) 150088WC, 2016 Ill. App.

LEXIS 478

See generally Larson’s Workers’ Compensation Law, § 128.02.

Source: Larson’s Workers’ Compensation Law, the nation’s leading authority on workers’ compensation law