Issue link: http://www.e-digitaleditions.com/i/83215
B. Definition The Virginia Workers' Compensation Act defines "injury" by stating it "means only injury by accident arising out of and in the course of the employment or occupational disease as defined in Chapter 4 (§ 65.2-400) et seq.) of this title…." (emphasis added) There are three separate principles at work in this analysis. If the claimant fails to put forth evidence sustaining his burden in any one prong of the analysis, the claim fails. To understand this definition better, one must look to case law, which defines what it means to suffer an "injury by accident" that "arises out of" and "in the course of" the employment. C. Injury by Accident An injury "arises out of" the employment only if there is a causal connection between the injury and the conditions under which the employer requires the work to be performed, or if some significant work-related exertion caused the injury. This definition excludes an injury which cannot be fairly traced to the employment as a contributing proximate cause. An accident is an event without human agency that, under the circumstances, is unusual and not expected. When an employee creates risks of his own choosing, which are altogether outside of any reasonable requirement of his employment, the risk arising from such action is not incident to and does not arise out of the employment. D. "Arising out of the Employment" The definition of an injury by accident excludes injuries from a hazard to which the employee would have been equally exposed apart from the employment. Virginia uses the "actual risk test" to determine whether an injury arises out of the employment. It is not enough that the accident happened at work. It must be shown to result from a work-related risk or significant work-related exertion. It is often said in this context that the risk must be peculiar to the work and not common to the neighborhood.