You may wish to consider the following:
Has the employee previously had an injury or illness of the same type that affects the same part of the body?
- If no, it is a new case.
- If yes, see the next question.
Has the employee recovered completely (all symptoms have gone) from the previous injury or illness, and has an event or exposure in the workplace caused the symptoms to reappear?
- If it is yes to both, then it is a new case.
When there is a disagreement between you, your employee, and the treating doctor on whether an injury is work-related, you should take reasonable steps to verify with your employee and the treating doctor whether the medical leave given was for any work-related accident suffered by the employee. This is also to facilitate the settlement of work injury compensation.
Regardless of your view or your employee's view on the matter, you must file the incident report first. The insurer or MOM will then investigate and assess the admissibility of the claim. This applies even if your account of the injury differs from the treating doctor's diagnosis.
It is also a legal requirement under the WSH (Incident Reporting) and Work Injury Compensation (WIC) Regulations that all injuries occurring at the workplace must be reported to MOM, regardless of whether they are found to be work-related or not. Failure to do so may constitute a breach of your obligations as an employer.