Getting Adequate Compensation After Whiplash Injury
Some injuries make for great conversations. If you show up at work with your arm or leg in a plaster cast, all your coworkers will rush to sign it, or if your workplace does not have that kind of vibe, they will at least jump at the opportunity to wish you well. If you get stitches, you will have a story to tell about your injury; even if the scar eventually fades, you can liven up dull social gatherings by showing the other party guests a picture of your injury. With invisible injuries, though, you often suffer in silence. Complex regional pain syndrome (CRPS) is at least as painful as an acute fracture, but try telling that to your family who think that you just want attention or to your work supervisor who thinks that you are just trying to get out of doing work. Whiplash injury does not look especially impressive to radiologists, and certainly not to people you meet in your daily life, but it can cause chronic pain that interferes with your ability to work and to engage in daily activities. It can always be a challenge to get insurance companies to pay sufficient compensation on an injury claim after a car accident, but this is especially true if the injury in question is whiplash. If you are struggling financially after suffering whiplash injury in a car accident, contact a Fort Lauderdale auto accident attorney.
Causes and Symptoms of Whiplash Injury
Whiplash injury is a sprain, a traumatic injury. It affects the muscles and other soft tissues of the neck and upper back, and it happens when something forcefully pushes the upper body forward and back. It is called whiplash injury because the movement of the spine resembles the movement of a whip. Any kind of physical trauma to the upper back can cause whiplash injury, but the most common causes are motor vehicle accidents, contact sports like football or rugby, and accidental falls during sports like skiing or wakeboarding.
Pain in the neck, shoulders, and upper back is the most common symptom of whiplash injury. It can also cause symptoms like numbness and tingling in the arms and neurological symptoms like blurred vision, impaired memory and concentration, and mood disturbances such as irritability or depression.
Why Whiplash Injury Can Be a Sticking Point in Car Accident Cases
Insurance companies want to pay as little on your claim as possible, because the less they pay you, the more they keep for themselves. Therefore, it is easiest to get compensation for injuries that you can easily show and to which you can clearly attach a dollar amount for treatment. Whiplash injury, being a soft tissue injury, does not show up on X-rays like bone fractures do, and healthcare professionals cannot see it by looking at you, like they can with open wounds.
Contact Boone & Davis in Fort Lauderdale, Florida today.
Source:
my.clevelandclinic.org/health/diseases/11982-whiplash
