Same-level and elevated falls account for the majority of California workplace injuries
Falls are the single most common category of disabling workplace injury in California, and they break into two clinically distinct groups: same-level falls (slips, trips, and falls on the same surface) and elevated falls (from ladders, scaffolds, roofs, and other heights). The first group dominates by frequency; the second group dominates by severity.
What our firm sees
Same-level falls produce shoulder dislocations, rotator cuff tears, hip fractures, knee meniscus tears, and lumbar spine injuries — the kind of injury that, on paper, sounds modest but in practice ends careers. Elevated falls produce traumatic brain injuries, spinal cord injuries, multiple-system trauma, and fatalities. Both are compensable under California workers' compensation law if they arise out of and in the course of employment.
Premises liability and third-party angles
If the fall occurred on premises owned or controlled by someone other than the worker's direct employer — a delivery driver who slipped at a customer's loading dock, a service technician who fell on a property owner's broken stairs — there is often a third-party premises-liability claim that runs alongside the workers' comp file. That third-party claim is not capped by the WC schedule and is frequently the most valuable piece of the overall recovery.
Documenting a fall case
Photographs of the scene. Names of witnesses. Preservation of any defective equipment (the broken ladder, the unsecured floor mat). All of it matters, and all of it gets lost quickly. The earlier a lawyer is involved, the more of that evidence survives.