6/5/2020 E-Library - Information At Your Fingertips: Printer Friendly During the follow-up consultation on 15 June 2009, Dr. Cruz noted that Carcedo’s wound was still open and that he was to continue his medications.[42] Carcedo’s injury required tending. This was 146 days from repatriation, and Dr. Cruz still had nearly 100 days within which to give Carcedo’s final disability assessment, yet he gave none. Indeed, the schedule of disabilities in the CBA, if there is one, or the POEA-SEC, should be the primary basis for the determination of a seafarer’s degree of disability. However, the POEA-SEC and the CBA cannot be read in isolation from the Labor Code and the AREC. Otherwise, the disability rating of the seafarer will be completely at the mercy of the company-designated physician, without redress, should the latter fail or refuse to give one. Here, the company-designated physician failed to give a definitive impediment rating of Carcedo’s disability beyond the extended temporary disability period, after the 120-day period but less than 240 days. By operation of law, therefore, Carcedo’s total and temporary disability lapsed into a total and permanent disability.[43] Even assuming that Dr. Cruz’s 24 March 2009 disability rating were definitive, Carcedo would still have a cause of action for total and permanent disability compensation. Dr. Cruz’s declaration of 8% impediment rating was made 63 days from repatriation, within the 120-day period. However, beyond this period, Carcedo was still incapacitated to perform his usual sea duties as he was still undergoing medical treatments and was confined in the hospital. In C.F. Sharp Crew Management, Inc. v. Taok,[44] the Court held: Based on this Court’s pronouncements in Vergara, it is easily discernible that the 120-day or 240-day period and the obligations the law imposed on the employer are determinative of when a seafarer’s cause of action for total and permanent disability may be considered to have arisen. Thus, a seafarer may pursue an action for total and permanent disability benefits if: (a) the company-designated physician failed to issue a declaration as to his fitness to engage in sea duty or disability even after the lapse of the 120-day period and there is no indication that further medical treatment would address his temporary total disability, hence, justify an extension of the period to 240 days; (b) 240 days had lapsed without any certification being issued by the company-designated physician; (c) the company-designated physician declared that he is fit for sea duty within the 120-day or 240-day period, as the case may be, but his physician of choice and the doctor chosen under Section 20-B(3) of the POEA-SEC are of a contrary opinion; (d) the company-designated physician acknowledged that he is partially permanently disabled but other doctors who he consulted, on his own and jointly with his employer, believed that his disability is not only permanent but total as well; (e) the company-designated physician recognized that he is totally and permanently disabled but there is a dispute on the disability grading; (f) the company-designated physician determined that his medical condition is not compensable or work-related under the POEA-SEC but his elibrary.judiciary.gov.ph/thebookshelf/showdocsfriendly/1/59949 11/19