If you must be off work for more than a few days because of your injury, your employer or its insurer must pay temporary disability benefits -- payments that replace your wage loss. These benefits are paid out at a rate of only two-thirds of your average weekly wage, but they are not reduced for taxes. If you are able to return only to lower-paying work, temporary benefits are available to make up the difference between your reduced pay and your full pay. Temporary benefits generally continue until you are able to return to full duty, or you are terminated from your job for a reason for which you are responsible, or your medical condition reaches a point called "maximum medical improvement."

Maximum medical improvement, or MMI, is the point at which your condition is not likely to improve with further medical care. When your Workers' Compensation doctor decides you have reached that point, he or she will also decide whether or not you have a permanent impairment. If you do, you will receive a "rating" -- a medical measurement of that impairment -- and your employer or its insurance company will either agree to pay you a monetary benefit based on that measurement, or contest the rating.