Arizona: Reimbursement for Travel Expenses for Medical Treatment Requires Showing That Local Treatment Could Not Be Obtained

An administrative law judge’s decision to award claimant mileage reimbursement for his travel from Flagstaff to Phoenix to receive medical treatment was erroneous where the record failed to establish that there was any actual need for such travel or that the medical treatment was unavailable in Flagstaff, held an Arizona court. Citing Larson’s Workers’ Compensation Law, the court observed reimbursement was appropriate in some instances, e.g., where the claimant lived in a rural area and could only get appropriate medical treatment through travel to a metropolitan area. Moreover, where the employer or insurer required the travel for treatment, it was appropriate to award the costs of such travel. Here, however, there had been no showing that the travel was actually necessary. Here claimant had received extensive medical treatment in Flagstaff. While it might have been appropriate for the claimant to seek additional medical treatment, because of ongoing pain, there had been no showing that such treatment could not have been obtained locally.

Thomas A. Robinson, J.D., the Feature National Columnist for the LexisNexis Workers’ Compensation eNewsletter, is a leading commentator and expert on the law of workers’ compensation.

LexisNexis Online Subscribers: Citations below link to Lexis Advance. Bracketed citations link to lexis.com.

See City of Flagstaff v. Industrial Comm’n, 2015 Ariz. App. LEXIS 27 (Feb. 24, 2015) [2015 Ariz. App. LEXIS 27 (Feb. 24, 2015)]

See generally Larson’s Workers’ Compensation Law, § 94.03 [94.03]

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

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