Injury to Dominant Hand

If an injury to an employee's dominant hand causes a disability as specified in s. 102.52 or(1) to (9) or amputation of more than two-thirds of the distal joint of a finger, the period for which indemnity is payable for that disability or amputation is increased by 25%. This increase is in addition to any other increase payable under s. 102.53 but, for cases in which an injury causes more than one permanent disability, the increase under this section shall be based on the periods specified in s. 102.52 (1) to (9) for each disability and not on any increased period specified in s. 102.53.*

* This provides an increase for injuries to the dominant hand that result in any amputation beyond 2/3 of a distal phalanx or 100 percent loss of use of any joint in the hand or arm. This multiple is in addition to the multiples in sections 102.53 (2), (4) and (5) but is not applied on those multiples. This multiple will be treated the same as those in s. 102.53 for computing permanent disabilities per DWD Administrative Code at section 80.50.

Simple Dominant Hand Calculation

For this example, we assumed the injury took place in January 2019 and the employee is entitled to the maximum rate of $362.00. The permanent partial disability rate is either the maximum rate for year of injury or employee’s temporary total disability rate, whichever is lower.

View Maximum Weekly PPD Rates for other dates of injury)

Injury: Amputation of right middle finger at the distal joint, right hand dominant.

• 100% of 8 weeks (per schedule) = 8 weeks
• Plus 25% of 8 weeks (for dominant hand) = 2 weeks
• 8 wks (amputation) + 2 wks (dominant hand multiple) = 10 weeks X $362.00 = $3620.00