On January 17, 2019 the New Jersey Appellate Division ruled that medical providers filing a “Medical Provider Application for Payment or Reimbursement of Medical Payment” seeking additional money from workers’ compensation insurance carriers have six years to file their claims. This is longer than the two year Statute of Limitations which applies to the underlying workers’ compensation claim. This decision will increase the number of Medical Provider Claims filed in New Jersey.
Reasoning of the Appellate Court.
In The Plastic Surgery Center, PA. v. Malouf Chevrolet-Cadillac, Inc, the New Jersey Appellate Division decided that a medical provider has to file a claim in the Division of Workers’ Compensation within six years of the service provided. The case has been reported.
The Court noted that suits on contracts in New Jersey have a six-year statute of limitations under N.J.S.A. 2A:14-1. When the New Jersey Legislature amended the New Jersey statute in 2012 granting exclusive jurisdiction over disputed medical charges to the Division of Workers’ Compensation, the Legislature never addressed which statute of limitations would apply. The Court found that the rationale for a two year statute of limitations does not fit N.J.S.A. 34:15-51, which is the statute of limitations provision in New Jersey. The Court ruled that
“[w]e are most persuaded that the Legislature intended to leave unaltered the time within which medical-provider claims must be commenced because the Act’s two-year-bar simply doesn’t fit.”
The Court found that a two-year rule could mean that the statute would run on the rights of the medical provider to file before the medical service is even provided because the medical provider might not render its service until after two years from the date of accident.
Impact of this Decision.
According to the statistics provided by the Division of Workers’ Compensation, one of every five claim petitions in New Jersey is a Medical Provider Claim. This decision will likely embolden medical providers, working outside of New Jersey but closely watching the medical provider claim action in this State because they are covetous of the “usual and customary” (extremely high) payment scheme, to accelerate the trend of opening satellite offices in New Jersey and with he plan of continuing to persuade their patients to “cross a river” and seek ambulatory surgery, procedures, and treatment in New Jersey at a much higher cost to the carrier.
This decision does not address the payment to be reimbursed where the claimant’s only contact with the state of New Jersey is the place of treatment rendered. Right now there are conflicting decision issued by trial-level judges (Judge of Compensation) in the many workers’ compensation courts (vicinages).
