prescriptions not great enough to cause addiction, but due in part to claimant’s personality problems, she took additional drugs and became addicted
How later courts described this case
- prescriptions not great enough to cause addiction, but due in part to claimant’s personality problems, she took additional drugs and became addicted
Written by the judges who cited it.
The opinion
WRIGHT, C. J.
I concur for the reason that there is no evidence that the prescribed medication was not a causative factor of petitioner’s disability and for the further reason that the referee’s finding that the disability would have resulted even in the absence of the industrial injury and the prescribed medication is not supported by substantial evidence. Dr. Malitz’s reports upon which the referee based his decision conclude that the psychic stress associated with petitioner’s injury was not a “causative factor” and that the prescribed medication was insufficient to cause drug habituation or addiction. In addition the reports state that petitioner’s preexisting personality disorder “has apparently resulted in excessive use and abuse of medicines” and that it would be “inaccurate and unfair to blame [petitioner’s] doctors for a manifestation of her pre-existing personality disorder.” From this last statement it cannot be concluded that petitioner’s disability is only a manifestation of her personality disorder and that the prescribed medication did not contribute to her addiction. Thus, there is no indication in Dr. Malitz’s re *840 ports that the disability would have occurred in the absence of the injury or the prescribed medication or that the prescribed medication did not contribute to the disability. As there is no evidence that the injury and treatment were not causative factors of petitioner’s addiction, I concur in the remand to the Workmen’s Compensation Appeals Board for further proceedings.