How Different Types of TBI Can Affect Your Personal Injury Settlement

Traumatic brain injuries (TBI) have a devastating effect on people who suffer them. These injuries usually linger for the rest of the victim’s life. However, not all TBIs are equivalent. Different types of TBI can have different effects on the quality of your life and on the settlements you receive from an insurance company.

Understanding Traumatic Brain Injuries

The brain is a delicate organ. It doesn’t take much damage to cause a serious injury. These injuries typically are a result of one of several types of head trauma.

Penetration

While relatively uncommon, penetration injuries are usually the most serious. With these types of injuries, a foreign object penetrates the skull and pierces the brain. These injuries often deal damage in deeper portions of the brain that aren’t injured in other types of TBIs.

Blunt Force Trauma

This is the type of TBI that is most commonly associated with football injuries. Blunt force trauma occurs when something strikes the head of the victim. The skull compresses and bruises the brain. This type of damage may appear minor at first. But it can worsen over time, especially if the person gets hit in the head at a later time.

Whiplash

This is a variation of blunt force trauma. When your head rapidly moves forward and backward, momentum causes your brain to collide with the inside of the skull. This most typically occurs in car accidents. Whiplash symptoms are quite similar to blunt force trauma TBIs.

Factors That Can Influence Personal Injury Settlements

The value of a personal injury settlement is typically dependent on the severity of the injuries that were suffered. Pain and suffering compensation is typically a multiple of all economic damages (damages that can be documented and calculated precisely).

When you suffer a relatively minor injury, your lawyer will often wait until all expenses and losses have occurred before negotiating a settlement. This ensures there aren’t any surprises later that you should have received compensation for.

However, a TBI lawyer doesn’t have that luxury. Most TBIs are catastrophic injuries that require years or even decades of treatment. But you can’t wait that long to get compensation when medical bills are piling up. Also, the statute of limitations in Wyoming and New Mexico are four years and three years, respectively.

This means that a TBI attorney needs to estimate the value of a TBI claim before negotiations with the insurance company. The better your lawyer understands the full extent of your injuries, the more likely you are to get a fair settlement in these circumstances.

Legal Strategies for Maximizing Compensation for a TBI

Maximizing the compensation for a TBI requires as much evidence as possible. This means that you and your lawyer need to be diligent about collecting and preserving evidence after you suffer an injury.

As soon as possible after suffering an injury, you should contact a TBI lawyer. While you probably aren’t in any condition to preserve evidence, your attorney can take the lead. They will interview witnesses, take photos of the accident scene, and discuss your injuries with your doctors and other medical professionals.

Your lawyer wants to be able to prove in court that the other party was legally responsible for your injuries. They also need to demonstrate the approximate cost of all medical bills and lost wages that will result from the injury. This means they need medical records that paint a precise picture of the extent of your injury and records of what type of long-term consequences patients with similar injuries require.

With any luck, your case will never go to trial. However, most attorneys will file a lawsuit at some point in the process. By filing a lawsuit, your lawyer effectively removes the statute of limitations. This means that you have as long as the court will give you to prove your case.

Additionally, personal injury defense lawyers are expensive. Insurance companies can usually save money by negotiating a fair settlement rather than going to trial. Filing the lawsuit places more pressure on them to settle.

FAQ

Where Am I Most Likely to Suffer a Traumatic Brain Injury?

Traumatic brain injuries can occur any time you suffer a blow to the head. Some of the more common causes of head injuries are construction accidents, car accidents, and birth injuries.

Should I Accept a Settlement From the Insurance Company After a TBI?

This depends on whether your attorney negotiated the settlement. Typically, if the insurance company offers you a settlement without talking to your lawyer, it will be worth quite a bit less than your claim should be worth. They make these offers knowing that you need money quickly and might accept a lowball offer if you are desperate.

Do I Need a Lawyer to Get a Fair Settlement?

Occasionally, claimants get lucky and get fair offers without legal representation. However, typically, you will only get a reasonable settlement if you are represented by an attorney. As a rule, claimants usually get more money when a lawyer negotiates their settlement than they get otherwise — even after attorney fees are calculated,

Contact The Spence Law Firm to Learn More About Types of TBIs

If you have suffered a traumatic brain injury, you could be facing a lifetime of medical bills and pain. The attorneys at The Spence Law Firm will help you get the highest settlement possible for the injuries that you suffered. We have the experience to accurately calculate damages, even when they involve future expenses and losses. Contact our law firm as soon as possible after getting injured.