Pascagoula Amputation Workers Compensation Lawyer: If Your Hand Was Taken At The Wrist, You Can Be Owed For The Whole Arm

One inch on an operative report is what a Pascagoula Amputation Workers Compensation Lawyer checks before anyone else does. A Pascagoula amputation workers comp lawyer knows one detail on the operative report can be worth more than the rest of the medical file combined. Not the surgeon’s name. Not the hospital. The exact point on the limb where the loss occurred, because Mississippi law treats an inch of difference as an entirely different category of benefit.

Here is what the adjuster is hoping you never check. If an arm or leg is amputated at or above the wrist or ankle, Mississippi law compensates it as loss of the entire arm or leg, a far larger award than a finger-by-finger or toe-by-toe count. A carrier that quietly values your case using the smaller schedule, without confirming exactly where the amputation line actually fell, is hoping nobody on your side reads the statute closely enough to catch it.

Pascagoula Amputation Workers Compensation Lawyer: The Law Behind An Amputation Claim

The amputation schedule in 71-3-17(c) uses fixed week counts. Arms get 200 weeks and legs 175. Hands get 150, feet 125, and eyes 100. Thumbs get 60. Fingers and toes get smaller counts, as low as 10 weeks. Most workers never hear about subsection (19). It treats a hand lost at the wrist, or a foot at the ankle, as losing the entire limb. That holds even if fingers or toes technically remain below that point.

The Second A Jammed Sheet Released Without Warning

He’s feeding stock into a shear machine at Bollinger, a sheet metal blank hanging up mid-cycle, and he reaches in to clear the jam the way he’s cleared a dozen minor snags before. This one releases without warning the instant his hand crosses the line, and the blade comes down before he can pull clear. Under Section 71-3-17(19), if that loss occurs at or above his wrist, Mississippi law does not compensate him finger by finger. It compensates him for the loss of the entire arm, 200 weeks, not a fraction of that number pieced together from a scheduled member table meant for a lesser injury.

Why The Exact Amputation Point Decides Everything

Here is the number the carrier hopes you never do the math on. A first finger alone pays 35 weeks. A thumb alone pays 60 weeks. A hand pays 150 weeks. An arm pays 200 weeks. A carrier motivated to minimize a claim has every incentive to describe the loss in the smallest possible terms, “partial hand amputation,” when the operative report may actually document a loss at or above the wrist that triggers the full arm classification under Section 71-3-17(19). The surgical record, not the adjuster’s summary of it, is the document that actually controls this classification.

Apportionment On A Limb With A Prior Injury

Had an old injury on that same arm or leg? The carrier will bring it up. Section 71-3-7(2) allows a cut only for the share a doctor’s findings tie to that old condition. That cut cannot be figured until you hit maximum medical recovery. Subsection (3)(a) is clear on that. Who picks the final percentage? Subsection (3)(b) gives it to an administrative judge, not the adjuster. An amputation is a discrete, catastrophic, fully documented event. Apportionment arguments on a clean traumatic amputation are far weaker than the carrier’s opening position will suggest.

The Two Deadlines On A Claim That Should Never Be Missed But Sometimes Is

One statute, 71-3-35, sets the pair. Notice must reach your employer within 30 days. If no compensation has been paid, the Commission filing is due within 2 years. An amputation is rarely missed on the notice side, since the injury is impossible to hide, but the 2-year filing deadline still matters if a dispute later arises over the exact classification or the final benefit calculation, and that dispute can take longer than expected to surface.

The Carrier’s Doctor Versus The Original Operative Report

The carrier’s Independent Medical Examiner may describe the amputation level in general terms favorable to the smaller schedule, without pulling and reviewing the original surgical operative report where the actual anatomical level of the loss was precisely documented at the time of surgery. That operative report, not a later summary written for claims purposes, is the evidence that actually controls whether Section 71-3-17(19)’s full-limb rule applies, and Mississippi law allows that evidence to be presented and an IME’s contrary summary challenged in front of the Commission.

Your TV Lawyer Has Never Argued Even One Case In The Jackson County Courthouse

A disputed Pascagoula claim does not get resolved by letter, it gets argued in a room, the Jackson County Circuit Court at 3104 Magnolia Street. Has the billboard lawyer ever stood in that room to argue a scheduled member classification dispute, one that turns on whether the full-limb rule of Section 71-3-17(19) reaches a partial-hand or partial-foot amputation? In that building, on a hearing docket, I have never seen his name next to a fight over the correct week count on a catastrophic loss like this.

Every workers’ compensation attorney in Mississippi takes cases on contingency, no fee unless you recover. Under the Foster Fair Fee Guarantee, you will always net more money than I take in fees, in writing, before we start. I take $0.00 out of your TTD check. Not a percentage, not a fee wearing a different name. That check is what carries your family through recovery and adjustment, and I have never once taken a cut of it.

For the full statutory language governing scheduled member and amputation classification, see Miss. Code Ann. Section 71-3-17 on Justia. For related reading, see the Pascagoula Workers’ Compensation Lawyer hub, together with the Pascagoula Legal Services page, is worth a look too.

If Your Hand Was Taken At The Wrist, You Can Be Owed For The Whole Arm

If your loss happened at or above the wrist, you can be owed the full 200-week arm classification, not a stitched-together count of individual fingers. What if your surgeon scheduled a procedure without reading your full chart? Imagine an accountant who mixes up gross and net income on your return, then files it anyway. Does the lawyer on your amputation claim even know Section 71-3-17(19) exists?

A real lawyer knows what it feels like to lose a contested hearing and come back stronger on the next one.A TV lawyer has never lost one, because he has never argued one.

Pascagoula Amputation Workers Compensation Lawyer | Pascagoula Amputation: Questions Answered Straight

P.S. The adjuster valuing your amputation claim already knows the difference between a hand classification and a full arm classification. Get my free book before you accept a settlement number based on anything less than your actual operative report.