Hello.
My name is Jason Perkins.
I'm a Georgia attorney.
I specialize in helping injured workers with their worker's compensation claims.
I'd like to talk to you a little bit today about permanent partial disability benefits.
Specifically, we're going to talk about the question of how long you will receive permanent
partial disability benefits.
You start getting permanent partial disability benefits when your doctor has given you a
permanent partial disability rating and you're no longer receiving wage loss benefits.
Wage loss benefits in Georgia are temporary total or temporary partial disability benefits,
and you won't start receiving permanent partial disability benefits until after those benefits
have stopped, or at least been suspended for a time.
If you have a permanent partial disability rating and the wage loss benefits have stopped
or been suspended, the insurance company should start paying you permanent partial disability
benefits.
How long you're going to receive those benefits is determined by the rating that you have
received from your doctor.
A permanent partial disability rating may be to the body as a whole or it may be to
a specific part of your body.
For example, it could be to the upper extremity, which means your arm, or it could be to your
finger or your hand or maybe to your foot or your lower extremity.
You may have a permanent partial disability rating to your eye.
How long will you be paid benefits for the rating?
It's determined by how high the rating is, but also the area of the body that you're
rated to will affect what that percent rating means as well.
If your rating is to the body as a whole, it's easy to determine.
Basically, every percent that you're rated entitles you to three weeks of benefits.
If you receive a 1% rating to your body as a whole, you'll get three weeks of permanent
partial disability benefits.
If you get a 10% rating to the body as a whole, you'll be paid 30 weeks of permanent partial
disability benefits.
Other areas of your body are a little bit trickier, because every area of your body
has a different total number of weeks as payable.
Your upper and lower extremities, your arms and your legs, are worth 225 weeks each, so
every percent that you're rated to those means that the insurance company pays you 2.25 weeks
of benefits.
If you end up with a 10% rating to your upper extremity, the insurance company is going
to pay you 22.5 weeks of benefits.
If you end up with a 20% rating to your upper extremity, they'll pay you 45 weeks of benefits.
There are total numbers of weeks available for many different parts of your body and
I can't cover all of those here.
You may also receive multiple ratings from your doctor.
For example, if you have an injury to your hand, the doctor may give you a permanent
partial disability rating for your hand, your upper extremity and the body as a whole.
Usually, you may be able to receive benefits for whichever rating would pay you the higher
amount of benefits, so it's important to understand that situation, that you need to look at each
rating and determine how many weeks each one would pay you.
One will probably pay more weeks than the others.
The insurance company may not always pay you the higher rating.
You may have to fight with them about this.
That's the information on how to determine how long you should be paid permanent partial
disability benefits for.
I hope you found this information helpful.
If you have, please let me know by giving a thumbs-up on YouTube.
You can also visit our YouTube channel to find other helpful worker's compensation videos.
If you've got some specific questions for me, I'd be happy to help you answer those.
You can set up a free consultation with me by visiting the website on the screen and
contacting me through it, or by calling me at 770-214-8885.
Thanks for watching today.