Cases of Note

OVERVIEW: The employee argued that the statute of limitations, Tenn. Code Ann. § 50-6-203, did not begin to run until either March 2002, the month in which he returned to the doctor for patch testing, or March 28, 2005, the date upon which the doctor testified that the employee had suffered a permanent medical impairment. The appellate court found that the trial court did not have an opportunity to make findings regarding the dates on which the employee discovered the compensability and the permanence of his injury. Because the employee raised the issue for the first time on appeal, the issue was waived. The employer ceased making payments on October 22, 1999, and the statute ran on October 22, 2000. There was a greater than one-year gap between voluntary medical payments. During that interval, the statute of limitations ran. The savings statute did not save the employee's claim where the second complaint was not filed until more than nineteen months after the voluntary dismissal of the first action.

OUTCOME: The judgment was affirmed.