When you have a personal injury case, it is incredibly important to get necessary medical care. While this may seem obvious, it is not uncommon for injury victims to minimize their injuries and choose not to get medical care. I have, in fact, seen this in my own practice.
What can happen if you don’t get necessary medical care?
I will give an example.
A few years ago, my client contacted me for a car accident case. Strangely, the car accident happened almost 4 years before she called me! This was not because another lawyer had helped her; she just decided to wait. She then proceeded to tell me she hurt her hip in the accident but did not get medical care. This was because many years before she had very traumatic experience involving a car accident, her medical doctors, and medications. Simply put, the prior car accident left her extremely skeptical and scarred by the personal injury process.
We sent a demand letter to the insurance carrier and argued that she hurt her hip in the car accident. Not surprisingly, the insurance company denied my client’s hip was hurt by the accident, citing to the lack of treatment over the past 4 years. Thankfully, during the course of negotiations we explained the reason for the delay and were able to secure a fair settlement.
Of course, not every case will end on a positive where the injury victim delays getting medical care. Sometimes, there may be no good reason for the delay in getting needed medical care.
So it is critical to get necessary medical care as soon as possible.
As you can tell, waiting to get necessary medical care can hurt your case. If you need medical care, get it right away!
We hope you enjoyed this post!
In the next post, we will discuss the third biggest way to lose your personal injury case – not communicating with your attorney.
Stay safe!