Why You Need a Traumatic Brain Injury Attorney When an Accident Gives You a “Bump On the Head”

As its name implies, a traumatic brain injury is a serious injury to your brain that causes it to begin malfunctioning in one or more ways. A TBI can be debilitating. It can produce symptoms that last for the rest of your life and disable you to the extent that you cannot work and earn a living. It can also cost you and your family millions of dollars in medical and other expenses. You therefore need to contact a traumatic brain injury attorney if you sustain a TBI due to someone’s negligence or wrongdoing. (S)he can file a lawsuit for you against the person responsible for your TBI and get you the compensation you deserve.

TBI Causes

TBIs are caused by a severe jolt to your head. For instance, when you hit your head during an accident, the force of the impact causes your head and neck to suddenly jerk forward and backward. This violent movement causes your brain to “slosh around” inside your skull. This injures its delicate cells and tissues in the process and consequently causing it to begin malfunctioning.

A penetrating head injury, such as from flying debris or a bullet piercing your skull, can also cause a TBI. However, most TBI injuries do not produce an open wound. In fact, you may mistakenly think you merely suffered a bump to your head.

TBI Incidents

Incidents that produce a TBI include the following:

• Falls
• Car crashes
• On-the-job injuries
• Sports injuries
• Medical malpractice
• Military attack or bomb blast

Statistics show that upwards of 2 million Americans sustain a TBI each year. Falls account for about 40.5% of them, while motor vehicle accidents account for another 14.3%. If you are a construction worker, your face an enormous risk of sustaining a TBI in a fall from one of the roofs, tall ladders or scaffolds from which you must perform many of your jobs. In fact, TBIs account for 25% of all construction deaths.

An experienced traumatic brain injury attorney can help you in all of these scenarios and more.

Initial TBI Costs

Any time you injure your head, you need to seek immediate medical attention. You should do so even if you believe you suffered only a minor bump. Why? Because only an experienced head trauma physician can assess your injury, order and analyze the proper tests and diagnose your condition. If you indeed suffered a TBI, you need to begin immediate treatment to minimize the damage as much as possible.

Your costs will begin to skyrocket when you receive a TBI and could easily reach over $1 million the first year alone for such things as the following:

• Hospital expenses
• Surgical expenses
• Prescription medication expenses
• Rehabilitation facility expenses
• Physical therapy expenses
• Occupational therapy expenses

In addition, depending on the severity of your TBI, these expenses will occur at precisely the same time as you have to take time off from work and therefore have no salary or wages coming in. It’s not difficult to see why you need to contact a traumatic brain injury attorney. You need to recover compensation as soon as possible from the person or entity that caused your TBI to have any hope of covering your medical and other costs.

Long-term TBI Costs

Your TBI can leave you with lingering symptoms that could last for the rest of your life, including the following:

• Vision problems
• Hearing problems
• Speech problems
• Cognitive problems
• Balance and coordination problems
• Emotional problems
• Negative personality changes

Experts estimate that if you sustain a TBI in your 20s, your annual costs could exceed $500,000 and your lifetime costs total over $15-$20 million. And this does not even take into account the costs to your family. Should your TBI make it impossible for you to return to work, one of your family members may well need to quit his or her job to stay home and care for you. This adds his or her loss of income to yours. In addition, caregivers themselves are prone to illnesses and conditions that other people do not face. You likely will max out your health care insurance within a relatively short period of time. What then?

Why You Need a Traumatic Brain Injury Attorney

For all of the above reasons and more, the sooner you begin working with an experienced TBI attorney, the sooner (s)he can file a personal injury lawsuit on your behalf against whoever caused your TBI, either through negligence or misconduct and wrongdoing.

The Legal Process

Personal injury lawsuits represent some of the most complicated and complex lawsuits imaginable and can take months to settle or reach trial. You need an experienced TBI attorney who will aggressively and relentlessly pursue your rights.

The process begins with gathering all of your paperwork together and presenting it to your attorney. Depending on what kind of an accident resulted in your traumatic brain injury, your attorney will need the following:

• Medical records and bills
• Ambulance bills
• Prescription medication bills
• Accident report if one exists
• Police report if one exists

Armed with this information, your attorney will file a lawsuit demanding that the person or entity responsible for your TBI compensate you for the economic damages you have suffered, as well as your noneconomic damages, such as pain and suffering.

(S)he will then begin negotiating with representatives from the defendant’s insurance company with the goal of arriving at a favorable settlement amount for you. Keep in mind, however, that insurance companies are loathe to pay claims, so these negotiations could take quite a while. If the insurance company ultimate refuses to settle, your traumatic brain injury attorney will take your case to trial and present it to a jury.

Experience Matters

This is where his or her trial experience makes all the difference. (S)he will not only need to convince the jury that you really are entitled to the amount of compensation asked for, but also likely will need to hire expert witnesses to testify as to the seriousness of your TBI and its consequences. These expert witnesses, such as doctors and other experts, will need to explain everything in layman’s terms rather than in medical jargon so the jury can understand exactly what happened, what negligence or wrongdoing on the part of the defendant caused it, and what continuing problems and expenses you face.

Work With an Experienced Local Traumatic Brain Injury Attorney

Submit a request online today or call us at (866) 345-6784 to get in touch with an experienced traumatic brain injury attorney in your area.