A Lincolnton, North Carolina man is reported to have died over the weekend after he was injured at RSI Home Products, a manufacturing facility in Lincolnton. The man was rushed to Carolinas Medical Center where he 
died of his injuries. RSI is investigating the death.
Paramedics would not detail the man’s injuries, and has stated that the sheriff’s office is investigating. RSI Home Products makes cabinets and related products with more than 5,000 workers in four states, as well as China and Mexico.
Workers’ compensation is a system of medical and disability benefits that are provided to workers who are injured on the job or who develop an occupational disease as a result of their employment. The North Carolina Workers’ Compensation Act is to provide a swift and certain remedy to an injured worker. Further, unlike other personal injury cases, the injured worker does not have to prove that the employer was at fault only that he or she was injured in a work related accident.
So, if the worker can establish that he or she was injured in a work-related accident, the claim is compensable, and the employer and its insurance company have a legal duty to provide necessary medical treatment and weekly disability benefit while the injured worker is out of work under doctors’ orders.
There are two types of benefits that workers’ comp provides: disability and medical compensation. Disability benefits are cash payments made to the injured worker as compensation for lost wages or permanent injury. So, if the injured worker is unable to work due to injury, he or she is entitled to weekly temporary total disability benefits equal to 2/3 of pre-injury wages.
Second, an injured worker who returns to work at lower pay is entitled to temporary partial disability worth 2/3 of the difference between pre-injury and post-injury wages. And finally, an injured worker may be entitled to permanent partial disability for a permanent injury.
An injured worker is also entitled to the medical care, often called medical compensation, necessary to heal the injury, provide relief from pain and other symptoms, and hasten the return to work. Medical compensation includes payment for doctor visits, medications, hospitalizations, and surgeries. Further, this medical compensation can include mileage reimbursement for doctor’s visits, vocational rehab, and nursing care, if required.
All of these expenses can continue to rack up, and if it is up to the injured worker to pay for such things, they would be broke in an instant. This is why you want to retain a competent workers’ compensation attorney to handle your case. At Robert J. Reeves, PC have assisted clients for over 25 years with workers compensation claims, and we can help you too. Call us at our Charlotte, NC office at 704-499-9000.