Adventist Health v. Workers' Compensation Appeals Board

The doctors and the workers’ compensation judge agree that this is a complicated case because the injured worker has been unable to find physicians in Maryland her employer will approve, and who will accept a California workers’ compensation case and comply with the reporting requirements while providing adequate treatment for her unremitting back pain. The petition for a writ of review by the self-insured employer, Adventist Health (Adventist), is but the latest installment in the ongoing battle over Evelyn Fletcher’s treatment.

*379 Everyone agrees that Fletcher needs a new treating physician. The employer does not challenge her right to or her need for future medical treatment, and the injured worker does not challenge the removal of her doctor, who failed to comply with reporting requirements. No one insists that the doctor who was temporarily enlisted to treat her should remain her treating physician. The precise factual issues before us are fleeting and of little lasting significance in a case that is now over 12 years old, though the underlying legal principles require explication.

Here, the workers’ compensation judge sought to craft a creative and compassionate…