Suffering an injury to your eyes is a life-changing event. It affects every single part of your daily routine. Many people don’t realize how much they rely on their sight until it becomes difficult to drive a car, shop for groceries, or even cook a simple meal. These injuries create new challenges that can feel overwhelming and frustrating.
Common and Rare Eye Conditions at Work
Workplace eye injuries aren’t always just about getting something stuck in your eye. We see a wide range of issues that happen on the job.
Jobs and the Risks They Face
Different types of work lead to different kinds of eye problems. Here are some examples:
- Construction and Woodworking: People in these jobs often get corneal abrasions. This happens when dust, wood chips, or metal shards scratch the surface of the eye.
- Welding and Manufacturing: Workers can suffer from “flash burns” or photokeratitis. This is like a sunburn on the eye caused by the bright light of a welding torch.
- Healthcare Workers: Nurses and doctors can get serious infections like conjunctivitis (pink eye) if fluids splash into their eyes while they are treating patients.
- Landscaping and Yard Work: High-speed debris from lawnmowers or trimmers can cause blunt force trauma or deep cuts to the eye.
- Office and Computer Work: Spending all day at a screen can cause severe Dry Eye Syndrome or chronic eye strain that makes it hard to see clearly.
We also help workers with very rare conditions, such as cancer that affects the eye or vision loss caused by being exposed to dangerous chemicals over a long period.
The High-Velocity Rule: More Time to Heal
Most people who are hurt at work can only get “Temporary Disability” payments for 104 weeks, which is two years.
But there is a special rule for eye injuries. Under Labor Code section 4656(c)(3)(F), if you have a “high-velocity” eye injury, you can get up to 240 weeks of payments. A high-velocity injury is when something hits your eye with a lot of force. This gives you much more time, nearly five years, to recover and get the medical care you need. This is a huge increase in benefits, but the insurance company usually won’t tell you about it.
Benefits for Total Vision Loss
There is another very important law in California called Labor Code section 4662(a)(1). This law says that if you lose your sight in both eyes, or if your vision is so bad that it is nearly gone, you are considered “permanently totally disabled.” This means you can receive weekly checks for the rest of your life to help you and your family.
How Your Settlement is Calculated
To get the most money at the end of your case, your doctor has to use a book called the AMA Guides, Chapter 12. This chapter explains exactly how to “rate” your vision loss. It is very technical and covers things like how well you see far away, how wide your vision is, and if you see double.
Attorneys David A Lee and Michael Lee are experts at using these rules. We make sure the doctors follow every page of Chapter 12 so that your final settlement is for the maximum amount allowed by law.
Why Contact Lee Partners Law: Injury Attorneys?
When your eyesight is on the line, you shouldn’t just hire any lawyer. You need a team that knows exactly how to fight for these special eye injury benefits.
David Lee and Michael Lee at Lee Partners Law: Injury Attorneys are Certified Specialists in Workers’ Compensation Law. This means the State Bar has recognized them as experts in this field. We know how to prove your injury was “high-velocity” and we know how to deal with the insurance companies when they try to stop your payments.
We are here to do the hard work for you so you can focus on your health.
Call Lee Partners Law: Injury Attorneys today for a free talk about your case.
Serving All of Southern California
We represent injured workers throughout Southern California, including:
- Los Angeles & The San Fernando Valley
- Orange County
- Riverside & San Bernardino
- Ventura & Santa Barbara
- San Diego
