Yesterday, students from Belmont Hills Elementary School spent their day off volunteering at Borough Hall in Narbeth.  The Martin Luther King Day event was coordinated by members of the school’s Home and School Association.

Throughout the school year, students at Belmont Hills have raised money to be used on food donations to the Narbeth Community Food Bank.  At the event, students and parents helped package and organize 450 meals worth of food donations before they were delivered to the food bank.

The event also had other ways to give back to the community.  A bake sale and coat, book, and food donations also helped support organizations in the area like Roxborough’s Northern Home for Children, ElderNet of Lower Merion and Narbeth, and Philadelphia’s Leidy Elementary School.

The Philadelphia workers’ compensation lawyers of Lowenthal & Abrams, P.C. would like to thanks Belmont Elementary School and other participants in the event for their efforts to better Philadelphia and surrounding communities in recognition of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.  To read more about the event, click here.

Last month, an appellate court in Pennsylvania determined that a workers’ compensation judge and appeals board were wrong to not award a former restaurant chef, manager, and smoker of 30 years workers’ compensation benefits.

The claimant filed for workers’ compensation after suffering a heart attack and needing quintuple bypass surgery.  According to court documents, in 2008, the worker suffered chest pains while moving beer kegs.  Three days later, the worker once again suffered chest pains, this time while lifting a heavy pot of chili.  He was subsequently hospitalized for multiple days and needed surgery.

The worker argued that the heavy lifting caused his injuries, heart attack, and disability.  A workers’ compensation judge and appeals board felt that testimony from the worker’s cardiologist was not sufficient to link his injury to the heavy lifting he performed at work.  However, the claimant appealed to the Commonwealth Court, which ruled that there was sufficient evidence linking his injury to the duties of his job.

If you or someone you know has questions about what constitutes a workplace injury or illness, contact the Philadelphia workers’ compensation attorneys of Lowenthal & Abrams, P.C. by calling 215-238-110 today.

The National Insurance Crime Bureau has reported that in 2010, the most common type of fraud reported in the state of Pennsylvania was workers’ compensation fraud.

Workers’ compensation fraud involves an employed individual lying to their insurance company to earn wages that they are not actually entitled to due to an injury that did not occur at the workplace.

In Pennsylvania, workers’ compensation fraud is considered a felony and carries with it a possible sentence of seven years in prison. If convicted, a fine of $15,000 per charge can also be enforced.

If you or someone you know has been injured as a result of employment conditions, please contact the Philadelphia workers’ compensation lawyers of Lowenthal & Abrams, P.C. by calling by calling 215-238-1130 today.

Rapper Jay-Z is being sued by the Workers Compensation Board of New York for allegedly failing to pay three months in workers’ compensation insurance in 2009.

A court has ordered Jay-Z to pay the $18,000 he owes for the three months he failed to make payments.  The insurance covered domestic employees such as chefs, maids, drivers, etc. According to court documents, the rapper only neglected to pay those three months and has since continued to pay his employees workers’ compensation. However, he never repaid the outstanding $18,000.

Sources say that Jay-Z denies these allegations and blames the the bill on a clerical error.

If you or someone you love has suffered an injury on the job, contact the Philadelphia workers’ compensation attorneys of Lowenthal & Abrams, P.C., at 215-238-1130.

The Pennsylvania-based company, Refractory Installation and Construction Headquarters Inc., was cited for lead exposure hazards and fined $ 54,600.

The U.S. Department of Labor’s Occupational Safety and Health Administration inspected the company after a report came in regarding an employee of the company containing a high level of lead in his blood. The OSHA gave the company 11 separate violations dealing with the overexposure of lead.

Extremely high lead levels were found at one of the company’s sites in Lyon Station, Pennsylvania as well.

Contact the Philadelphia workers’ compensation lawyers of Lowenthal & Abrams, P.C. by calling 215-238-1130 if you or someone you know has been injured in the workplace.

British Columbia recently joined 6 other Canadian territories that grant workers’ compensation to workers experiencing high levels of stress.

The Workers’ Compensation Act in British Columbia was expanded by allowing stress-out workers to receive mental stress benefits.  Previously, mental stress benefits were limited to workers who recently had “an acute reaction to a sudden and traumatic event.”

The act does not allow stress benefits to be given to workers for being fired, for having to adjust to chances in the workplace, or for the stress of being disciplined at work.  Furthermore, workers must be able to provide a stress diagnosis from a qualified physician in order to qualify for this type of workers’ compensation.

British Columbia’s Labour Minister Margaret MacDiarmid stated, “There is a huge hidden cost to not addressing mental illness.  If you are a worker and you’ve has a chronic problem at work, this can really decrease productivity.  It can cause sick time.  It can cause actual accidents in the workplace.”

If you are seeking workers’ compensation benefits for a disability, injury, or illness, contact the Philadelphia workers’ compensation lawyers of Lowenthal & Abrams, P.C. at 215-238-1130 to learn more about how we can help you.

Tuesday, the U.S. Occupational Safety and Health Administration revealed their list of the top 10 safety violation citations found in their investigations into workplaces across the country.

The most commonly issued citation was for fall protection.  Last year, the federal workplace safety agency issued 7,139 citations for fall protection violations.  The year before, scaffolding violations were found to be the most common problem among employers in the U.S.

Scaffolding was the second most frequently cited violation in 2010.  OSHA issued 7,069 scaffolding violations last year.  Most of these violations involved incorrect setup or positioning of scaffolding.

The other types of citations in the top 10 list were for respiratory protection, hazard communication, wiring, ladders, lockout/tagout, machine guarding, powered industrial trucks, and electrical violations.

If you or a loved one has been injured in an accident caused by an unsafe work environment, contact the Philadelphia workers’ compensation attorneys of Lowenthal & Abrams, P.C. at 215-238-1130 to learn more about filing for and receiving workers’ compensation.

A New Jersey appeals court recently approved a workers’ compensation claim filed by the husband of a woman who died from a blood clot she developed while working for AT&T.  The woman’s former employer appealed the filing, arguing that factors unrelated to her job caused the blood clot.

The 25-year old woman’s work for AT&T involved several hours in a row of sitting at a desk and working on a computer.  The woman developed a blood clot in her leg which moved to her lung and killed her.  The night that the clot formed, the woman was working long hours overnight to finish a project for AT&T.

The other factors AT&T claimed led to her death included obesity, a sedentary lifestyle, and taking birth control pills.  Despite these factors, the court felt that the sedentary nature of her job was what caused the blood clot to form.

If someone you love has been injured while on the job, contact the Philadelphia workers’ compensation lawyers of Lowenthal & Abrams, P.C. at 215-238-1130 to learn more about your rights.

As computers and other forms of technology become more important throughout society and the workplace, more and more workers are experiencing eye strain and vision problems.  Occupational tasks involving long hours of looking at a computer screen cause the greatest number of eye strain injuries.

Some eye and vision issues that one may experience after spending several hours staring at a computer screen include blurred or double vision, headaches, back or neck pain, eye muscle spasms or twitching, inability to focus, and red, dry, or itchy eyes.

Variables that affect eye strain include glare on a computer screen, bad lighting on the computer or in the office, position of the computer screen, and what is being viewed on the computer screen.

If you or someone you know has developed vision or eye strain problems as a result of working conditions, contact the Philadelphia workers’ compensation lawyers of Lowenthal & Abrams, P.C. at 215-238-1130 to learn more about whether or not your are eligible to receive workers’ compensation benefits.

This week, the Pennsylvania Department of Labor and the Industry Bureau of Workers’ Compensation announced that they are sentencing five employers for workers’ compensation violations.  The five employers were from T&T Contracting, D&A Lawn and Landscape Services, LLC and three businesses that had already closed by the time they were issued citations.

The five employers were sentenced to time in the Accelerated Rehabilitative Disposition program.  The program is for first-time workers’ compensation offenders.  The T&T owner was also sentenced to 2 years of probation, 15 hours of community service and a $14,604 fine.  The owner of D&A in Bernville was fined $6,500 after pleading guilty to the violations.

If you or someone you know is not receiving the workers’ compensation they deserve, contact the Philadelphia workers’ compensation attorneys of Lowenthal & Abrams, P.C. at 215-238-1130 today.