Townsend Grace Co. v. Ackerman

Bond, O. J., delivered the opinion of the Court. Ackerman, a man who had a very high blood pressure, was employed in a straw hat factory, and he claims compensation for disability resulting from a stroke of apoplexy and subsequent paralysis which, he contends, were brought about by an accidental fall while he was at work. And the controversy is upon the question whether the stroke of apoplexy or a precedent accidental fall and injury, inducing the stroke of apoplexy, caused the disability. In his original claim the man stated merely that, “cleaning a kettle, I fell over”.

And in his testimony before the commission he said he slipped and fell, feeling giddy as he fell, but not before. There were no bruises to show hard impact. And the diagnosis of the hospital physicians attributed the disability only to the stroke of apoplexy as’ a cause. And on the evidence before it the commission disallowed the claim of compensable injury.

On appeal, and trial of the issue of fact before a jury, there was added testimony of striking the head in the fall. The claimant testified that he had no dizziness before his fall, that he slipped on wet and sticky glue on the floor, turning his foot, and struck his head, and that upon striking his head he became unconscious. The weight and credibility of the evidence so added are attacked here, but all such objections could be, as they presumably were in this case, considered only on motion in the trial court for a new trial. ³⁷ It is legally sufficient evidence of an accident preceding the stroke of apoplexy; and, with respect to the legal sufficiency of the whole evidence, it leaves only the question of support for a finding that the stroke of apoplexy and subsequent paralysis, which disabled the man, were in point of fact caused by the fall and striking of the head. Medical experts called by the claimant testified first that the apoplexy and paralysis could have been caused to such a man by such a fall and striking of the head, and also that apoplexy and paralysis could come on a person with high blood pressure at any time without an accident.

Experts produced by the employer and insurer denied the possibility of bringing on, by the fall and bump of the head, the rupture of the particular blood vessel broken in this instance. And then, in rebuttal, one of the claimant’s experts was asked whether such a fall and bump of the head, even when not sufficient to produce a bruise, would probably cause a man with high blood pressure to suffer apoplexy and paralysis, and he answered that he thought it would. The question and answer are objected to as absurd, in inferring a probability of apoplexy and paralysis from such a fall and bump to any and every man suffering from high blood pressure, but we think the preceding discussion in the case clearly enough confined the inquiry to the particular man. The