What if I cannot afford the gas money to get to physical therapy?

An award for medical treatment allows an injured worker reimbursement for mileage to and from doctor’s appointments, physical therapy, lab work, diagnostic testing, and other medical appointments. However,you cannot be reimbursed for mileage to and from the pharmacy to get prescriptions filled as it is assumed that a pharmacy trip will be included in the mileage for the medical appointment itself. Also, you are not entitled to mileage for litigation purposes. This means that you will not be reimbursed for mileage to and from a deposition, your attorney’s office, or to the Virginia Workers Compensation Commission.

In some cases, an injured worker can request transportation to the medical appointments and the workers compensation carrier will arrange the transportation. The injured worker usually has to have a reason why he or she cannot get to the medical appointment, such as driving restriction, car broke down, etc. You cannot receive both mileage and transportation, however.

The current mileage rate is $.555 per mile. When mileage is submitted, you will need to include the address where you started your travel, the address of the medical appointment, and the total round-trip mileage you incurred. We recommend that you calculate how much you are owed for each trip and the total you believe you are owed for each submission. We also recommend that you submit your mileage reimbursement requests monthly. This makes it easier for the adjuster to confirm that you had a medical appointment on the date you are requesting mileage and, thus, you are more likely to get your mileage reimbursement check faster than if you wait until the end of the claim or submit your mileage less frequently.