Chest injuries are a common consequence of car and other vehicle accidents, as well as accidents involving falling or swinging objects and falls after tripping over. No-one sets out to have an accident. You may be a cautious and careful person who normally minimizes risks. However, it is impossible to prevent every unintended accident, especially if it has been caused by someone else’s negligence. Because serious chest injuries can be hard to treat, you may find that you are saddled with bills you just didn’t expect.
If you lose a lot of time at work or have to forfeit your job, the financial consequences could be severe. It is vital that you find out whether you can recover these expenses through a personal injury claim.
Chest Injuries Can be Fatal
All chest injuries can be potentially very serious or even fatal. If they have been caused in an accident, they may be just superficial bruises or cuts and scrapes on the chest’s outer surface. However, it is common for ribs and the sternum or breastbone to fracture in an accident and the partly severed ends of these bones can cause further damage to internal organs.
Before the advent of airbags, chest injuries were as common as whiplash still is in rear end vehicle accidents, as the driver or passenger was thrown forwards on impact. Even with air bags, the chance of chest injuries is still present, if reduced.
Damage due to internal organ rupture, especially the lungs and heart, may not show up straight away. If the chest has been injured at all in a serious accident, it should be inspected as soon as possible and any injuries treated.
Personal Injury Claims Because of a Chest Injury
As chest injuries can be extremely costly over a long time period, it is essential that a personal injury claim be filed if at all possible. As with any other claim, this is only possible if the accident was the fault of another party and this must be able to be proved. In some states, the law may still allow the injured party to make a claim, even if they were partly to blame for the accident. In other states, if the injured party was even slightly to blame, it may be impossible to make a claim. In all states, there is a time limit in which a claim must be made after an accident occurred called the statute of limitations. This can be very short if a government agency is declared as the party at-fault.
An Experienced Attorney Can Make All the Difference
If you have had a serious injury needing extensive surgery and expect that it will have an impact in the long term on your life, it makes sense to use an experienced personal injury attorney to help prepare a claim and negotiate a fair settlement. Chest injuries do not just heal up quickly. The medical and income costs into the future may need to be calculated very carefully otherwise you could end up out of pocket even if you are able to negotiate some kind of settlement.
An experienced attorney will have dealt with this kind of injury claim before and will be able to assess what sort of amount you will need to claim in order to handle anything you need to deal with in the years to come.
