Our High-Risk Activity
Michael Babboni
Car Accidents
In modern American society, there is one major risk which we’re exposed to almost every day and which is so common that we hardly even recognize it as a danger: road traffic. Make no mistake, the world is a dangerous place – there are knives in your kitchen, dangerous bacteria in raw meat and eggs, and at any moment you could use a match or a lighter to set your house or apartment on fire. However, because of the weight and speed of motor vehicles, the boundary between life and death is as easy to cross as it is to step onto a highway at just the wrong moment.A Life-Changing Injury
A majority of all auto accidents are nothing more than fender-benders, an unfortunate tap that happens during a sloppy parking job or else because someone stops a little too late at a traffic light. The police usually aren’t interested in such accidents unless someone gets injured or there’s significant damage and a question of fault. Sometimes, however, something dramatic happens.
Maybe a driver in a hurry tries to gun his way through a left turn during a yellow light, but he overestimates how far away the car in the opposite lane is. Maybe a distracted driver doesn’t notice the light changing and charges into an intersection already full of cars. Maybe a pickup truck loses a tire on the highway and begins to roll when it skids into the ditch. Such accidents are rare overall, but we all risk encountering them every time we climb into a car, truck, or bus.
Even with all the safety features that come standard with every modern vehicle, it’s all too easy to suffer a major injury during a significant accident. Part of the problem is simply the effect which physics have on your head. A sudden deceleration will whip your neck around, causing whiplash, a minor concussion, or possibly worse. Brain injuries can be subtle and hard to detect, and their effects may take months or even years to surface.
The Long Road To Wellness
If you find yourself in a major crash and you wind up lucky, then at most all you’ll have to worry about are some bruises and maybe a few cuts. If you’re only slightly less lucky, you’ll end up with a broken arm, leg, finger, or toe. These injuries can be very painful at first, but with proper care your bones will reknit and you’ll be back up to 100 percent in no time.
A joint injury is another matter, however. Joints don’t always grow back the way they were before, which means you may be stuck with limited mobility for the rest of your life. You may also wind up disfigured by burn scars and require a skin transplant to replace damaged areas.
Organ failure may result from an injury to the torso. While this is never a good situation, some injuries are more urgent than others. Heart and lung failures have obvious and fatal consequences, but a sudden shock to your lower torso may damage your kidneys, forcing you to either get a transplant or use a dialysis machine for the rest of your life.
If you’ve been injured in a traffic accident and your insurance coverage is drying up far too quickly, try contacting an auto accident lawyer today. Someone familiar with your individual situation and with the laws that surround it may be able to get more out of the insurance company than what you could get on your own. Insurance providers regularly try to get away with providing as little compensation as they can manage, and a good lawyer from a strong firm may be able to get more simply by providing the implied threat of litigation. Remember, it’s not just your finances that are at stake, it’s your future.