I saw this posted on a legal Q&A forum and I thought it was worth discussing here.  An injured Illinois worker asked the following:

I work in a hospital and I hurt my back crawling on a cement floor putting cell slides away on August 23rd the same day I told my Supervisor. My Supervisor told me to tell my other Supervisor and he was no where to be found. I went to the prompt care that night due not being able to walk or straighten my back and excessive pain. I was told on 9/7/2018 that I didn’t follow the proper follow through. Monday I called into work due to not being able to work and then went Human Resources and filled out a Application for the incident report and then went to Health Occupation. This what Human Resources told me to do. My question is this, how do I find out if I still have an Illinois Workman Compensation Case. My Case Worker told me to continue with Health Occ and Physical Therapy. Well I don’t want to be stuck with $1000s of dollars due a MRI and Physical Therapy. Both my Supervisor’s have been harassing me as well. Need your opinion and advice. Thank you in advance.

There is no such thing as proper follow through, at least not as they are describing it.  She reported her injury the day she got hurt.  That was the proper follow through.  Getting prompt medical treatment was proper follow through too.

She definitely still has a case and all she needs to do to protect herself is file an Application for Adjustment of Claim with the State of Illinois  That will force them to respond to the medical bills.

The reality is that she has done everything right and is just being pressured for no good reason to act like her bills aren’t work related.  Of course there is no reason she should pay anything out of pocket or be stuck with any medical bills at all.

Essentially the company is making up some reporting steps that don’t exist. When you are hurt on the job in Illinois, you have to report it to your employer within 45 days of it happening, hopefully sooner.  If you get medical treatment right away it makes it almost impossible for them to say that your treatment wasn’t for a work injury.  They are playing games with her health when she has done everything right.

The positive here is that it will be an easy problem to solve once the form is filed with the State. Of course it’s a joke that she had to go through this at all.

If you have any questions about your case, please call us at 312-346-5578.  We cover all of Illinois and every consultation is free.