[krodrio]

My husband was injured on the job in 2013 and developed CRPS from his injury. His attorney called yesterday and said the case has been closed and it is not worth it for them to continue with the case (we are broke and have no money for an appeal). The attorney claims that the employer has 6 IME doctors willing to testify against my husband that he is not severely injured. I routinely have to take my husband to the ER because his pain gets so bad that he passes out, he's been on fentanyl patches for several months and he needs assistance showering, is on crutches, etc. SSDI ruled that he is permanently partially disabled but an attorney feels the judge made a mistake on the case and that the judge's decision should be overruled and my husband declared permanently 100% disabled. For my husband's L&I case, they have told us that the SSDI ruling of PPD doesn't help his L&I case at all. Sorry if I am rambling, I don't know where to turn next and cannot believe that this is happening. My husband doesn't communicate well with doctors and doesn't always speak up. Because I am disabled it has been inferred that I am teaching my husband to be disabled so that he never has to work again.

We are located in Washington state.

Thank you for any help anyone can be at this point. We have 30 days to get an appeal filed (attorney notified us of case closure by a copy of the L&I determination and no further explanation from the attorney).

[1171]

Your husband should not be charged upfront $$$ for appealing a work comp decision.
Your husband can switch attys at any time. He should interview more then one before deciding. The new atty will handle all the paperwork necessary to make the change.
He should only consider attys that specialize in workers compensation law.
https://www.avvo.com/workers-compensatio...er/wa.html
Wilg.org
Www.wsba.org

he should also consider getting an atty that specializes in SSDI claims. SSDI is federal and uses separate criteria for determining disability.

P.S. the appeal time limit is generally 60 days from receipt of decision. you can contact the board of Industrial Insurance Appeals to be sure.
https://fortress.wa.gov/biia/efiling/New...BIIA02.ASP
http://www.biia.wa.gov/OfficeLocations.html

[krodrio]

Thank you so much for your reply. I have a list of attorneys to work off and hope we can find one that will help. I can't believe that just dropped my husband stating they needed $$$$ up front to do the appeal (his time loss was stopped last May and they were complaining that we weren't paying them)

We do have an excellent SSDI attorney and I can only hope we can get his L&I case back on track.

[1171]

attys are allowed a reasonable fee out of benefits recovered; there should not be a separate fee for filing an appeal.