“Eman at Yazdchi Law was extremely professional, responsive, and supportive at all times. He and his staff exceeded all of my expectations.”
Andrea Dalessandro
✦ Board-Certified Specialist in Workers’ Compensation Law — State Bar of California ✦
Back injuries are the #1 workers’ comp claim in California — and among the most undervalued.
By Eman Yazdchi, Esq. · Certified Specialist in Workers' Compensation Law
Back injuries are the most common workers' comp claim filed by Mojave workers, and the industries here produce some of the most severe spinal conditions in Kern County. BNSF Railway crews at the intermodal yard absorb years of whole-body vibration riding locomotives and railcars through the switching yard, coupled with heavy lifting during coupling operations and manual switch throws. Aerospace technicians at the Mojave Air & Space Port spend hours in awkward postures — bent over fuselage sections inside experimental aircraft at Scaled Composites, reaching overhead to install wiring harnesses at Virgin Galactic, or crouched inside confined engine test structures at Stratolaunch. Truckers hauling freight along Highway 58 endure chronic spinal compression from thousands of hours in a cab seat absorbing road vibration.
The challenge with back injury claims is not proving you are in pain — it is proving the extent of your permanent disability and defeating the insurer's apportionment arguments. A herniated disc at L5-S1 may sound straightforward, but the difference between a 20% disability rating and a 45% rating can mean over $100,000 in additional compensation. For Mojave's high-wage aerospace engineers and railroad workers, that gap widens further because permanent disability benefits are calculated against your average weekly wage. Insurers know this and fight aggressively to minimize ratings through apportionment under LC §4663.
From our office on Avenue M-14 in Palmdale — 30 minutes south on the 14 — we handle more back injury claims from Mojave industrial workers than any other injury type. We litigate these cases at the Bakersfield WCAB, where the judges see Kern County's heavy-industry spine cases regularly and expect the thorough medical evidence our office provides.
California uses the AMA Guides to the Evaluation of Permanent Impairment, 5th Edition to rate permanent disability from back injuries. The rating process directly determines your compensation, and the difference between methods can be worth tens of thousands of dollars.
The AMA Guides 5th Edition provides two methods for rating spinal impairment. The Diagnosis-Related Estimates (DRE) method is the primary approach, categorizing injuries into five levels based on clinical findings — radiculopathy, loss of motion segment integrity, and surgical history. The Range of Motion (ROM) method measures actual spinal flexibility and is used when DRE does not adequately capture your impairment, typically for multi-level disc injuries or cases involving significant range-of-motion loss that DRE underrepresents. Insurers routinely push for whichever method produces the lower rating. We advocate for the method that accurately reflects the disability caused by your railroad, aerospace, or trucking work in Mojave.
Apportionment under LC §4663 is the insurer's primary weapon against back injury claims from Mojave's industrial workforce. The strategy is predictable: the insurer's doctor reviews your MRI, identifies "degenerative changes," and attributes a percentage of your disability to aging or pre-existing conditions rather than your work at BNSF or the Air & Space Port. A 50-year-old BNSF switchman with 20 years of service might be found to have 45% permanent disability, but the insurer argues 60% of that is "non-industrial," reducing the compensable rating to just 18%.
We fight unfair apportionment with medical evidence demonstrating that industrial activities were the predominant cause of the current condition — that degenerative changes were asymptomatic before years of railroad vibration or aerospace assembly work, and that the apportionment opinion lacks the substantial medical evidence required under Escobedo v. Marshalls. This is technical litigation that requires a specialist who understands both the medical science of spinal degeneration and the legal framework of industrial causation.
When your treating physician recommends spinal surgery — discectomy, laminectomy, or fusion — the insurer must authorize it through Utilization Review (UR) based on the Medical Treatment Utilization Schedule (MTUS). If UR denies the surgery, we appeal through Independent Medical Review (IMR) under LC §4610. IMR is decided by independent physicians not selected by the insurer. Given Mojave's remote location and the severity of industrial back injuries from railroad and aerospace work, surgical delays caused by UR denials can significantly worsen outcomes. We pursue IMR appeals aggressively to prevent that deterioration.
Injured at work in Mojave? Call (661) 273-1780
Tap to call →Mojave back injury claims are heard at the Bakersfield WCAB in Kern County. Apportionment disputes and permanent disability rating challenges are litigated here, often requiring expert medical testimony from qualified evaluators familiar with industrial spinal injuries.
Mojave lacks local spine specialists. Workers are typically referred to orthopedic and neurosurgical spine centers in Bakersfield or the greater Lancaster area. We ensure your treating physician is within the MPN, provides thorough AMA Guides-compliant documentation, and supports the rating methodology that reflects your true impairment.
Back injury PD ratings range from 10% for mild strains to 60% or higher for multi-level fusions with complications. For Mojave's high-wage aerospace and railroad workers, the elevated average weekly wage drives PD benefit amounts higher than for comparable injuries in lower-wage industries. A 35% rating for a BNSF switchman can be worth substantially more than the same rating for a minimum-wage worker.
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