Getting Fair Compensation for Nerve Damage After a Car Accident
Car accidents can cause a wide range of injuries, leaving victims with everything from broken bones and lacerations to traumatic brain injuries and nerve damage. If you experience tingling, numbness, and weakness in parts of your body after a crash, you may have suffered nerve damage.
If you’ve suffered any sort of injury after a crash, it’s important to fight for fair compensation. The team at Reeves & Mestayer is ready to help you pursue full compensation. Get started now by calling us at 228-300-2754.
Types of Nerve Damage
There are several ways your nerves may be damaged in a car collision. The first is neurapraxia, which occurs when the nerve suffers compression or stretching during a crash. While it may cause some temporary symptoms, neurapraxia generally resolves fairly quickly if you get enough rest. Symptoms can also be treated with ice and heat.
A slightly more severe type of nerve damage is axonotmesis, which happens when the axons and myelin sheath are damaged. However, other parts of the nerve remain intact. This is a more serious injury and may require physical therapy to restore full use of the affected area.
The most serious type of nerve damage is neurotmesis, which happens when the nerve is completely severed. In some cases, prompt surgical care can allow the victim to regain some use of the affected area. However, if treatment is delayed or unsuccessful, the victim may lose functionality forever.
What Type of Compensation You May Receive
It can be difficult to secure fair and full compensation for your nerve damage. Until you have sought treatment and gone through all of your available options, there’s no real way to know whether or not your injuries will fully heal. As a result, fair compensation is difficult to determine.
As you may imagine, insurance companies will err on the side of a full recovery. They’ll claim that your injuries are unlikely to be permanent and that you deserve minimal compensation as a result. However, they are protecting their own best interests, not yours.
Even if you don’t yet know if you’ll make a full recovery, you deserve to be fairly compensated for your injuries. Talking to a car accident attorney should be your next step. Depending on what the evidence says, you may receive compensation for:
- Medical expenses
- Future medical costs if your injury will require further medical intervention
- Lost wages
- Lost future income if your injury affects your ability to work permanently
- Pain and suffering
- Disability and disfigurement
Proving Your Nerve Damage
A big part of a personal injury claim is proving that you have been injured. First, you may want to keep a log of your symptoms and how they progress each day. Common symptoms of nerve damage include:
- Numbness, especially in your extremities
- Burning or stabbing pain
- Muscle weakness and loss of control
- Random pain that comes without a trigger
- Sensitivity to touch or changes in temperature
- Lack of coordination
You should also get as much medical evidence as possible. When you meet with your personal injury attorney, make sure to provide as much documentation as you can. Diagnostic scans, feedback from your doctor, treatments you have tried, your next steps, medications, and other information can help your attorney convince the insurance company that you are owed compensation.
As you pursue compensation and navigate your personal injury claim, make sure you do everything that your doctor recommends. This can be challenging when the doctor prescribes physical therapy and other time-consuming treatments. However, failing to follow your doctor’s treatment can put your injury claim in danger. You have a duty to mitigate the damage of the crash by doing everything you can to ensure a full recovery.
Reach Out to Reeves & Mestayer Now to Discuss Your Case
Working with the right personal injury attorney can help you get treated fairly by the insurance company. Don’t trust the insurance adjuster to offer the settlement you truly deserve—let us guide you through this process. Set up a consultation with our team now. Just call us at 228-300-2754 or contact us online. We’re ready to advocate aggressively for you as you heal from your injuries.
