New York: Mental Injury Caused by Ordinary Supervision is Not Compensable

Substantial evidence supported the Workers' Compensation Board's factual determination that the claimant's depressive condition was not compensable, because claimant's supervisors described normal oversight and monitoring practices undertaken to assist her in correcting deficiencies in and improving her performance. Claimant, a registered nurse case manager, alleged that, due to harassment and bullying by her managers, she suffered a relapse of preexisting depression and anxiety that caused her to cease working. The court acknowledged that mental injuries caused by work-related stress are compensable if the claimant can establish that the stress that caused the injury was greater than that which other similarly situated workers experienced in the normal work environment. The court added, however, that under N.Y. Work. Comp. Law § 2(7), claims for mental injuries due to work-related stress were precluded if the mental injury was a direct consequence of a lawful personnel decision involving a disciplinary action, work evaluation, job transfer, demotion, or termination taken in good faith by the employer. The court said it would not disturb the Board’s factual findings.

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

LexisNexis Online Subscribers: Citations below link to Lexis Advance.

See Matter of Lanese v. Anthem Health Servs., 2018 N.Y. App. Div. LEXIS 6751 (3rd Dept., Oct. 11, 2018)

See generally Larson’s Workers’ Compensation Law, § 56.04.

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