Full Opinion

FIRST DISTRICT COURT OF APPEAL STATE OF FLORIDA _____________________________ No. 1D2024-1623 _____________________________ JOSEPH DURDEN, Appellant, v. ST. JOHNS COUNTY FIRE RESCUE/ PREFERRED GOVERNMENTAL CLAIMS SOLUTIONS, Appellees. _____________________________ On appeal from an order of the Office of Judges of Compensation Claims. Timothy S. Stanton, Judge of Compensation Claims. Date of Accident: August 24, 2023 November 4, 2026 RAY, J. This workers’ compensation appeal turns on whether atrial fibrillation (“AFib”) is “heart disease” under Florida’s heart-lung statute, section 112.18, Florida Statutes (2023). Relying on our decision in North Collier Fire Control and Rescue District v. Harlem, 371 So. 3d 368 (Fla. 1st DCA 2023), the judge of compensation claims (“JCC”) concluded that it was not and denied Joseph Durden the statutory presumption available to firefighters. A closer examination of the original meaning of “heart disease” and the reach of Harlem, however, shows that Durden’s AFib is covered. We therefore set aside the denial of AFib compensability and related benefits to the extent they rested on that determination, and remand for further proceedings. I Durden joined St. Johns County Fire Rescue in 2007 as a firefighter and paramedic. On August 24, 2023, while on vacation, he awoke with heart palpitations and a rapid, irregular pulse. He went to the hospital, where he was diagnosed with AFib and treated with medication. He was discharged that day. Durden later sought workers’ compensation benefits for AFib and hypertension. He requested temporary disability benefits, cardiology treatment, payment for emergency hospital care, and related relief. At the final hearing, the employer/carrier (“E/C”) acknowledged that Durden’s preemployment physical revealed no evidence of AFib and conceded that he satisfied the statute’s disability requirement if AFib qualified as heart disease. The E/C also withdrew its defense seeking to rebut the statutory presumption of occupational causation. The central question, then, was whether AFib qualified as heart disease under the statute. Both independent medical examiners—Dr. David Perloff for Durden and Dr. Steven Borzak for the E/C—testified that AFib is heart disease. They described it as an electrical disorder that disrupts the heart’s normal function. Neither found evidence of structural damage to Durden’s heart or weakening caused by degradation of its vessels or valves. The JCC acknowledged that testimony but read Harlem to limit “heart disease” to conditions that weaken the heart through degradation of vessels or valves. Because Durden’s AFib did not meet that definition, the JCC denied compensability and the related claims for benefits. On rehearing, he clarified that he understood Harlem’s definition to govern all claims involving “heart disease” under section 112.18. 2 II We review the meaning of “heart disease” in section 112.18 de novo and the JCC’s underlying factual findings for competent, substantial evidence. See Mylock v. Champion Int’l, 906 So. 2d 363, 365 (Fla. 1st DCA 2005). A Section 112.18 gives firefighters a rebuttable presumption that a disabling condition caused by tuberculosis, heart disease, or hypertension arose from their work. § 112.18(1)(a), Fla. Stat. (2023). To qualify, a firefighter must also have passed a physical examination upon entering service that revealed no evidence of the claimed condition. Id. Once these requirements are met, the presumption supplies the link between the condition and the firefighter’s work. See Caldwell v. Div. of Ret., 372 So. 2d 438, 440– 41 (Fla. 1979). When the Legislature first enacted section 112.18 in 1965, it used the term “heart disease” without defining it or identifying the conditions it covered. See ch. 65-480, § 1, Laws of Fla. We therefore consider what that term meant at the time, including how the medical profession used it. See Tsuji v. Fleet, 366 So. 3d 1020, 1025 (Fla. 2023); Antonin Scalia & Bryan A. Garner, Reading Law: The Interpretation of Legal Texts 33 (2012) (explaining that context includes “a word’s historical associations acquired from recurrent patterns of past usage”). The 1957 edition of Dorland’s Illustrated Medical Dictionary defined “heart disease” as “any organic, mechanical, or functional condition of the heart that causes trouble.” Dorland’s Illustrated Medical Dictionary 396 (23rd ed. 1957). It defined “functional” as “of, or pertaining to, a function; affecting the functions, but not the structures.” Id. at 536. In other words, heart disease could affect how the heart works without damaging its structure. Medical publications from the same period support that understanding. A 1964 report of the President’s Commission on Heart Disease, Cancer and Stroke included “functional diseases of the heart” in its description of heart disease. A National Program to Conquer Heart Disease, Cancer and Stroke, vol. I, at 2 (1964). 3 Other publications addressed fibrillation specifically. In 1957, the World Health Organization classified auricular fibrillation as a disorder of heart rhythm under the broader category “Functional disease of heart.” World Health Org., Manual of the International Statistical Classification of Diseases, Injuries, and Causes of Death, vol. 1, at 146 (1957). A 1964 federal report also identified atrial fibrillation detected by an electrocardiogram as a finding sufficient to establish definite “Other Heart Disease.” Nat’l Ctr. for Health Stat., Heart Disease in Adults: United States—1960–1962, ser. 11, no. 6, at 6 (rprt. 1976) (1964). The testimony here is consistent with that historical understanding. Both cardiologists identified AFib as heart disease and confirmed that it was recognized as such in the 1950s and 1960s. Dr. Perloff explained that AFib causes chaotic electrical activity in the atria, preventing them from contracting normally. Dr. Borzak likewise described how AFib disrupts the electrical system that controls the heart’s pumping function. Neither doctor found evidence of structural damage to Durden’s heart or weakening through degradation of vessels or valves. Both nevertheless agreed that AFib interferes with the heart’s normal function. Durden’s AFib therefore falls within the original meaning of “heart disease” under section 112.18. B The E/C argues that Harlem requires a different result. To be sure, the JCC’s reliance on that decision is understandable. We described “heart disease” as a disease affecting and weakening the heart muscle through “degradation of the vessels or the valves.” 371 So. 3d at 377. That description would exclude Durden’s AFib if read as an exhaustive definition. But Harlem must be understood in light of the question it decided. See Bryan A. Garner et al., The Law of Judicial Precedent 80 (2016) (explaining that judicial language must be interpreted with reference to “the circumstances of the particular case and the question under consideration”). The claimant there had a thoracic aortic aneurysm, a condition affecting an artery extending from the heart. In finding the aneurysm compensable, the JCC relied on our earlier decision in City of Venice v. Van Dyke, 46 So. 3d 115 4 (Fla. 1st DCA 2010), which held that the claimant’s thoracic aortic disease qualified as heart disease. The surgery in Van Dyke, however, included reimplantation of the aortic valve and reattachment of the coronary arteries. Id. at 115–16. Van Dyke relied in part on a medical dictionary defining “heart disease” as “any organic, mechanical, or functional abnormality of the heart, its structures, or the coronary arteries.” Id. at 116. It also treated the ascending aorta as a heart structure because it appeared in a dictionary illustration. Harlem explained why that illustration alone could not establish that the aorta was part of the heart. 371 So. 3d at 371–74. Even so, Harlem read Van Dyke as relying on the involvement of the aortic valve, which supported an inference that the disease had weakened part of the heart itself. Id. at 375. We then examined the original meaning of “heart disease,” focusing on coronary, hypertensive, and valvular conditions that burden and weaken the heart muscle. Id. at 375–77. On that basis, we held that the claimant’s thoracic aortic aneurysm was not heart disease under section 112.18. Id. at 377. Durden’s AFib presents a different question. Unlike the aneurysm in Harlem, it affects the heart itself by disrupting the electrical activity that controls normal atrial contractions. It is a functional disorder of the kind recognized as heart disease when section 112.18 was enacted. Since the JCC ruled, we have addressed that distinction in Village Center Community Development District v. Illeck, 51 Fla. L. Weekly D1957, 2026 WL 2854377 (Fla. 1st DCA Sept. 23, 2026). There, a firefighter suffered from supraventricular tachycardia and atrial tachycardia, disorders involving the heart’s electrical system. Id. at *1. Both medical experts testified that those conditions were recognized as heart disease in 1965. Id. at *3. Yet both agreed that the conditions did not meet the definition of “heart disease” drawn from Harlem. Id. at *2. We affirmed the award of benefits, explaining that Harlem used a “limited-purpose definition” of “heart disease” suited to the cardiovascular condition before it. Id. at *3. That definition did not foreclose coverage of disorders involving the heart’s electrical 5 system. Id. We also noted that our decisions have long treated cardiac arrhythmias, including AFib, as heart disease under section 112.18. Id. The same reasoning applies here. Like the arrhythmias in Illeck, Durden’s AFib disrupts the heart’s electrical function without the vascular or valvular degradation described in Harlem. With the remaining statutory requirements undisputed and the rebuttal defense withdrawn, Durden’s AFib is compensable under section 112.18. See Caldwell, 372 So. 2d at 440–41. III We set aside the JCC’s denial of compensability for Durden’s AFib and the related benefit denials to the extent they rested on that determination. On remand, the JCC must resolve the remaining issues concerning Durden’s claims for AFib benefits. The separate denial of compensability for hypertension, which Durden does not challenge, remains undisturbed. SET ASIDE in part and REMANDED. ROBERTS and TREADWELL,* JJ., concur. _____________________________ Not final until disposition of any timely and authorized motion under Fla. R. App. P. 9.330 or 9.331. _____________________________ Vincent J. Leuzzi of Bichler & Longo, PLLC, Maitland, for Appellant. Brooke A. Shegda, George W. Boring, III, and George A. Helm, III, of Public Entity Legal Solutions, Lake Mary, for Appellees. Judge Treadwell was substituted for an original panel * member in this proceeding after oral argument. 6 Nathan Koch and Katie B. Privett, Tallahassee, for Amicus Curiae Florida Department of Financial Services and Florida Chief Financial Officer. 7