This website, and any viewing, reading, or receipt of the information herein, does not create an attorney-client relationship. These numbers are weighed down by the fact that the average accident involves a short, 3-6 week injury and minor collision. Cervical Kyphosis: Symptoms, Causes & Treatment - Cleveland Clinic Required medical expenses included spinal fusion surgery as well as future medical attention, including epidural injections in his cervical spine. Main symptoms include neck pain or stiffness. He has been practicing law for 10 years. Keep reading to find out what causes a loss of lumbar lordosis. Car accident verdict with cervical soft tissue injury. In turn, this factor increases its overall settlement amount. A bulging disc occurs when the outer cartilage of the spinal disc cracks, revealing its soft center. Once you give them this and they discover hurtful information, there is no undoing that. The Cervical Spine Research Society. Fan Li, Nian-song Liu, Hong-geng Li, Biao Zhang, Shi-wei Tian, Ming-gang Tan, Baptiste. Improper posture and muscular spasm are two important causes for loss of cervical curvature. However, thats not to say general damages dont increase the value of your case. If youve recently injured your neck in an accident, doctors have likely referred to your injuries as damage to the cervical spine, the medical term for the bones and tissue that make up your neck. In stories, we hear from people, those diagnosed with craniocervical instability following a car accident that caused the whiplash-associated reversal of cervical lordosis, are the stories that suggest something was already going on in their neck and the car accident was the final straw. The person will tell us about a head-on car accident that initially did not cause them any problems at all. Loss of cervical lordosis from a car accident - Caring Medical Florida Building a strong attorney-client relationship with a knowledgeable attorney is essential to your case. Typically, these accidents happen at speeds of less than 15 miles per hour. When discussing cervical spine injury settlement amounts, you must bear in mind the strength of your personal injury case. In the state of Arizona, you need to file an insurance claim with the at-fault drivers insurance company to seek compensation for your damages. A paper published in The British Journal of Radiology (1) suggested straightening of the C-spine alignment in MDCT (as seen in a multidetector (MDCT) CT scan) alone is not a definitive sign of injury. Hyperextension injuries can also cause vertebrae and spine dislocation. Its key to work alongside a car accident lawyer to determine how your neck injury affects your lifetime income. Craning the neck at a 60-degree angle to look down a phone you just pulled out of your pocket increases the pressure on the neck by 5-6 times, and it can also lead to a straightening of the vertebrae. Our auto accident practice includes service in the follow areas: Serving all of Los Angeles, including Arcadia, Beverly Hills, Claremont, Canoga Park, Chino, Chino Hills, Covina, Diamond Bar, Downey, East Pasadena, El Monte, Encino, Highland Park, Inglewood, La Verne, Long Beach, Malibu, Montebello, Monterey Park, North Hollywood, Northridge, Pasadena, Pomona, Rancho Cucamonga, Reseda, Rosemead, San Gabriel, San Dimas, Santa Monica, Sherman Oaks, South Bay, South LA, South Pasadena, Sunland, Tarzana, Thousand Oaks, Torrance, Van Nuys, Venice, West Covina, West Hollywood, and Westlake Village. The lawyer has to fight for your case, file a lawsuit, go through depositions, and treat your case like a big case. $9,500 trial verdict for neck injuries resulting from a minor rear-end accident. Vehicle accident settlement with cervical disc injury, $30,000 2020 Mar;6(1):124. $1,200,000 settlement for aggravation of pre-existing neck injury, requiring surgery, after plaintiff rear-ended in an, what the person being sued (the defendant) would be willing to pay, and. If you have pain in your neck, you should go to the emergency room or an urgent care as soon as you can. These delicate bones influence your center of gravity, mobility, and more. Cervical Lordosis - What is It and Why is It Important? Sometimes, that nominal amount is $5,000, and they think they just pulled a fast one on the insurance adjuster but what this does in reality is close the door on any more money when you realize your injury is actually worse. With the ability to cause chronic, systemic issues later in life, untreated or misdiagnosed neck injuries resulting from car accidents can be serious and debilitating. When you are in a car accident hit from behind and whiplash is suspected, getting proper diagnostics is important. Throughout the insurance claim or lawsuit process, you must provide a plethora of evidence, give a detailed breakdown of all damages (special and general), and establish liability. The text notes that in one study, x-rays taken an average of 7 years after whiplash injury showed neck disc arthritis was present in 39% of the patients. Do NOT use this as the average value of YOUR case. A neck injury requiring spinal fusion or another surgical intervention will be "worth" more than a strained neck requiring a few weeks in a brace. This is evidenced by the multi-million examples above in which all victims required surgery. Spine,39(13), 1018-1028. Regardless of the underlying cause of a straight neck, the impact can be severe. Take the Quiz! In summary, loss of lordosis can and usually is associated with irritation of the muscles causing loss of the normal curvature. Neck Injury Settlement Examples | AllLaw This includes becoming . For your own sake, if you decide to wing it without a car accident attorney which is a terrible idea for so many reasons do not settle the case in the first 3-4 months. In comparison, a minor injury that requires weekly chiropractic treatment may only cost $10,000 a year, depending on insurance. Thus, how much settlement you can get for your neck injury depends on who is fighting in your corner. $1,200,000 Settlement for Auto Accident Victim With Neck Injuries. Surgeries involve lengthy hospital visits and require rehabilitation. Article Author: This law article was written by attorney Ray Benyamin, Esquire. The lumbar spine is your lower back, from the bottom of your ribs to your hips. Cervical lordosis meaning is that it refers to the normal curve of the spinal cord. Before searching for cervical spine injury settlement amounts, its important to fully understand the types of damages that can be included in an injury claim. They tell the story of a bad whiplash that reversed their cervical spine lordosis. Ultimately, those who have whiplash injuries have been often shown to have poor quality of life long after their accidents. While no amount of money can erase the accident, it can help a victim resume a normal lifestyle as best as possible. For instance, a no-fault state like Florida may handle a case differently than a fault state, like Arizona or Texas. Doing that requires a lot of time. The significance of changes to the normal cervical lordosis following an automobile trauma has been the subject of a number of studies. Violent collisions may damage one or more spinal discs, causing a bulge or disc herniation. Continued. Cervical spondylosis is the natural wearing down of cartilage, disks, ligaments and bones in your neck. Muscle irritations can be caused by disk herniations , muscle sprains, and fractures. Car accident neck injury amounts will be greatly affected by the steps you take in the period following your accident. During a car accident, the rapid forward-backward or side-to-side motion can cause these delicate tissues to stretch or tear. Whiplash is the rapid movement of the neck and head forward and then returning to the head rest. Not only does the impact of a collision affect the neck, but the anticipation of impact often causes the individual to tense their neck muscles, meaning that theyll have more potential for injury than if their muscles were relaxed. Your attorney will investigate all aspects of the collision and document each detail of the case beforesubmitting a demand letterto the other partys insurer. Car accidents can cause a lot ofserious injuries, and among the most serious are injuries to the cervical spine. Posted on . For mild cervical kyphosis, your provider will recommend nonsurgical treatment. They are also one of the most commonly undervalued injuries in car accident settlements. $3,500,000 Rear end car accident verdict with cervical disc injury, $1,850,000 Learn more about how the nature and extent of injuries affects claim value. Cervical spine neck injuries can be physically, emotionally, and financially devastating. Compression fractures can cause chronic pain that worsens with movement over time. But it still has value in an auto accident lawsuit. Whiplash is one form of soft tissue neck injury. Upper or lower back pain. Severe, chronic headaches. This likely explains why in excess of 80,000 neck injuries resulting from car accidents are recorded in the U.S. making traffic collisions the primary cause of neck injuries. Of course, there are also stories from people who have a long history of neck problems and their car accident/whiplash injury turned occasional neck pain, dizziness, vertigo, and radiating pain into a daily event. Anyone suspected of having such an injury should remain as immobile as possible until medical assistance arrives. Estimating the potential recovery with any degree of accuracy is quite difficult for one main reason: at trial, it will most likely be a jury that ultimately decides just how much money the defendant must pay the injured plaintiff. Clin. They in fact felt fine and had no symptoms, then as a year or two passed their symptoms became progressively worse. 9+ loss of cervical lordosis after car accident most standard Injury Mechanisms & Criteria, 2001. Additionally, "hard" injuries like a fractured bone (cervical fracture in the case of a neck injury) tend to result in larger settlements than soft tissue injuries like whiplash or pinched nerve (cervical radiculopathy). Several radiological cervical angular variables (the change of the angle of the cervical spine as in lesser angle degree manifest as straightening or loss of lordosis) are suggested to have constitutional (impacting the neck and the whole body) characteristics, that is, them being minimally influenced by body positioning (the neck curvature has become its own world, the movements of the body no longer impact a neck with significant curve problems).