Delaware Code Title 19 Sec. 2343 – Physical examination of employee; refusal to submit; communications …
(a) After an injury, and during the period of resulting disability, the employee, if so requested by the employee’s employer or ordered by the Board, shall submit the employee’s own self for examination at reasonable times and places and as often as reasonably requested to a physician legally authorized to practice the physician’s profession under the laws of such place, who shall be selected and paid by the employer. Such medical examination shall not be referred to as an “Independent Medical Examination” or “IME” in any proceeding or on any document relating to a matter under this chapter; nor shall any examination, required by the employer, by any other doctor, who is an employee of an insurance company, or who is paid by an insurance company, or who is under contract to an insurance company, be referred to as an “Independent Medical Examination” or “IME.” If the employee requests, the employee shall be entitled to have a physician, qualified as specified in this section, of the employee’s own selection, to be paid by the employee, present to participate in such examination. For all examinations after the first, the employer shall pay the reasonable traveling expenses and loss of wages incurred by the employee in order to submit to such examination. The Board may impose a fine not to exceed $500 for each use of the term “Independent Medical Exam” or “IME” in violation of this subsection.
Terms Used In Delaware Code Title 19 Sec. 2343
- Board: means the Industrial Accident Board. See Delaware Code Title 19 Sec. 2301
- Continuance: Putting off of a hearing ot trial until a later time.
- Contract: A legal written agreement that becomes binding when signed.
- Employee: means every person in service of any corporation (private, public, municipal or quasi-public), association, firm or person, excepting those employees excluded by this subchapter, under any contract of hire, express or implied, oral or written, or performing services for a valuable consideration, excluding spouse and minor children of a farm employer unless the spouse or minor child is a bona fide employee of a farm employer and is named in an endorsement to the farm employer's contract of insurance, and excluding any person whose employment is casual and not in the regular course of the trade, business, profession or occupation of his or her employer, and not including persons to whom articles or materials are furnished or repaired, or adopted for sale in the worker's own home, or on the premises not under the control or management of the employer. See Delaware Code Title 19 Sec. 2301
- Employer: includes all those who employ others unless they are excluded from the application of this chapter by any provision of this subchapter, and if the employer is insured, the term shall include the insurer as far as practicable; employer shall also include the governing body for which employable relief recipients are assigned work under §§ 901-905 of Title 31. See Delaware Code Title 19 Sec. 2301
(b) The refusal of the employee to submit to the examination required by subsection (a) of this section or the employee’s obstruction of such examination shall deprive the employee of the right to compensation under this chapter during the continuance of such refusal or obstruction and the period of such refusal or obstruction shall be deducted from the period during which compensation would otherwise be payable.
(c) No fact communicated to or otherwise learned by any physician or surgeon who has attended or examined the employee or who has been present at any examination shall be privileged either in the hearings provided for in this chapter or in any action at law.
Code 1915, § ?3193m; 29 Del. Laws, c. 233; Code 1935, § ?6083; 19 Del. C. 1953, § ?2343; 70 Del. Laws, c. 172, § ?4; 70 Del. Laws, c. 186, § ?1; 72 Del. Laws, c. 206, § ?2; 72 Del. Laws, c. 399, § ?2;