6/7/2020 E-Library - Information At Your Fingertips: Printer Friendly justify a conclusion.[16] Gauged by the foregoing yardstick, the Court finds that the Court of Appeals committed a reversible error in attributing grave abuse to the NLRC for awarding compensation to the petitioner for his illness after the latter established his claim by substantial evidence. We find that there is a cogent legal basis to conclude that petitioner has successfully discharged the burden of proving that his condition was aggravated by his working condition. For one, petitioner was employed by respondent as Chief Cook which constantly exposes him to heat while preparing the food for the entire crew all throughout the day while he was under employ. The steady and prolonged exposure to heat naturally causes exhaustion which could unduly burden his heart and interfere with the normal functioning of his cardiovascular system. In simple terms, petitioner's ailment called dilated cardiomyopathy is a condition in which the heart's ability to pump blood is decreased because the heart's main pumping chamber, the left ventricle, is enlarged and weakened.[17] In petitioner's case, his dilated cardiomyopathy is caused by a bicuspid aortic valve. Bicuspid aortic valve is an aortic valve that only has two leaflets, instead of three.[18] The aortic valve regulates blood flow from the heart into the aorta, the major blood vessel that brings blood to the body.[19] Bicuspid aortic valve is present at birth (congenital). An abnormal aortic valve develops during the early weeks of pregnancy, when the baby's heart develops. The cause of this problem is unclear, but it is the most common congenital heart disease. It often runs in families.[20] Even if it were shown that petitioner's condition is congenital in nature, it does automatically take his ailment away from purview of compensability. Pre-existence of an illness does not irrevocably bar compensability because disability laws still grant the same provided seafarer's working conditions bear causal connection with his illness.[21] As succinctly pointed above, petitioner's working environment as chef constantly exposed him to factors that could aggravate his heart condition. Compensability of an ailment does not depend on whether the injury or disease was pre-existing at the time of the employment but rather if the disease or injury is workrelated or aggravated his condition.[22] It is not necessary, in order for an employee to recover compensation, that he must have been in perfect condition or health at the time he received the injury, or that he be free from -disease.[23] Every workman brings with him to his employment certain infirmities, and while the employer is not the insurer of the health of his employees, he takes them as he finds them, and assumes the risk of having the weakened condition aggravated by some injury which might not hurt or bother a perfectly normal, healthy person.[24] The degree of contribution of the employment to the worsening of the seafarer's condition is not significant to the compensability of the illness, thus: elibrary.judiciary.gov.ph/thebookshelf/showdocsfriendly/1/61708 6/9