Often-Ignored Injuries and How They Can Affect You
The human body does not function in real life like it does in video games. There’s no clear indicator of how much damage you may have taken at any given time, how many “hit points” you have remaining. This means that our perception of injury can often be vague, shaped by social forces and our own fears of injury, illness, and above all; inconvenience. Inspecting every little bump and bruise takes time, and getting it checked professionally costs money. Nobody wants to cancel plans or gain a reputation as a hypochondriac, so we often lean to “walk it off” and trust the body’s natural self-healing properties. This is often the right move, until it very much isn’t. Today’s Malloy Law blog post will cover ignored injuries that can rapidly turn serious.
Concussions or Traumatic Brain Injuries
Increased concussion awareness, especially in the context of youth sports, has given many people a greater understanding of how devastating these injuries can be. Unfortunately, it’s also given many people a fairly narrow idea of what a concussion looks like. We picture a dramatic blow to the head, resulting in immediate disorientation or loss of consciousness.
However, this is often not the case. A concussion can occur due to hard shaking of the head or a sudden stop, such as the sort that would be experienced in a car crash. Furthermore, the most dramatic symptoms of a concussion; dizziness, confusion, loss of memory, or even swelling of the brain, can take hours or even days to manifest.
Soft Tissue Injuries
While concussions have seen greater levels of awareness over the past decade, soft tissue injuries in the neck and back have been subject to a long-term campaign of diminishment. Torn muscles, tendons, or stretched ligaments are often siloed under the mocking label of “whiplash.” This leads to many people attempting to simply ignore these injuries. This leaves them vulnerable to secondary inflammation, increasing their pain, stiffness, and discomfort. These injuries can affect mobility and lead to chronic pain and should always be treated with the utmost seriousness.
Internal Bleeding
The lack of apparent external injuries is no guarantee of health in the wake of an accident. Blunt force trauma can bruise or lacerate internal organs without breaking the skin. Abdominal tenderness, dizziness, or low blood pressure can be symptomatic of life threatening internal bleeding.
Hairline Fractures
It’s possible that a small crack in a bone can leave you with a time-bomb in your leg or arm, disguising itself as a sprain or especially deep bruise. Stressing a limb which has undergone a hairline fracture can lead to a full break, requiring surgery.
Why Does It Matter?
Treating these frequently ignored injuries has a certain self-evident value in the sense that we all want to live healthy lives and avoid serious health scares or prolonged recovery periods. But in the context of personal injury law, the difference between ignored injuries and prompt treatment and diagnosis can often be the difference between claiming just compensation or not. When an injured person is evaluated by a doctor right after their accident, the doctor’s diagnosis becomes an impartial third party account of both the severity of the injury and an undeniable link between the injury and the accent. When an injury is initially ignored and becomes more severe after the fact, insurance companies may claim it was not actually sustained in the accident, and deny coverage. Being proactive saves more than just medical headaches, it can save you substantial amounts of money.
How Malloy Law Can Help
If you or a loved one has been injured in an accident caused by another party’s negligence, Malloy Law is here to help. Our experienced and diverse team can evaluate your case free of charge and plot a path to maximum compensation on your behalf. We’ll pursue compensation for lost wages, medical bills, and emotional trauma. Don’t wait, contact Malloy Law today and let’s win your case.