Serious brain injuries affect not only the victim and their ability to work and live independently but also every member of the family. Spouses and children may have to adapt to caretaking roles in the household, providing the care and support their loved one now requires. At the same time, the two-income household often now relies on a single income while medical bills, rehabilitation costs, and care expenses continue to add up.
At the Law Offices of Anidjar & Levine, our skilled lawyers can help you understand your family’s legal options for compensation if a brain injury occurred because of another person’s careless or negligent behavior. Call us today for your free case review and learn about how one of our brain injury lawyers in Miami can help. We can help your family get the compensation you deserve and improve the quality of life for everyone in your household.
Who Is Liable for My Brain Injury?
Brain injuries can occur as a result of a number of accidents. According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), the top cause in 2013 was falls. Other common causes of head and brain injuries include motor vehicle accidents, boating accidents, gunshots, assault, child abuse, medical malpractice, defective product accidents, and sports accidents.
We can trace most of these causes back to a preventable injury, sometimes caused by another person’s negligence. When the injury occurred because another person acted carelessly—if a driver ran a red light, for example—you may be eligible to file for compensation from the liable party.
Why Are Brain Injuries So Costly?
Every brain injury is different. The treatment, rehabilitation, ongoing care, and medical costs vary widely depending on the location and severity of the injury. Minor brain injuries like concussions usually clear up in a few weeks. More serious brain injuries, however, can cause a variety of serious symptoms, including:
- Confusion;
- Memory loss;
- Seizures;
- Cognitive and physical disabilities;
- Altered sensory and nerve reactions;
- Emotional concerns; and
- Personality changes.
Treating these side effects can be costly. Victims of a serious brain injury may spend days or weeks in the intensive care unit, followed by an extended period of inpatient treatment and rehabilitation. Upon returning home, they may face ongoing care, including assistance with daily living activities, feeding tubes, ventilators, and other life-sustaining equipment. During this recovery time, a brain injury victim is often unable to return to work.
All of these expenses quickly amass a huge debt. Bills never stop coming in because of the in-home care costs. Many brain injury survivors never make a full recovery and struggle to overcome permanent disabilities. Returning to a previous job may not be an option for those with cognitive and physical disabilities, intensifying financial stress.
How Can I Get Compensation for My Injuries?
If you or a loved one suffered a brain injury in an accident caused by a careless or negligent person, we may be able to file a claim for compensation on your behalf. Florida laws allow you to file an insurance claim or personal injury lawsuit to collect money to cover your losses after this type of incident.
While the laws that outline how we proceed vary somewhat based on how your injuries occurred and the identity of the negligent party, we can usually help qualified clients negotiate a fair settlement to cover their medical bills, lost wages, ongoing care costs, and other losses without ever filing a lawsuit. Instead, we file a third-party liability claim based on the at-fault party’s auto, homeowner’s, or business insurance policy.
If it comes down to it and the insurance company refuses to offer you a fair payout for your claim, we will discuss the possibility of filing a lawsuit in civil court. This is sometimes the impetus the insurer needs to reopen negotiations, and even filing a suit does not mean your case will go before the judge.
What Role Does Negligence Play in Brain Injury Claims?
Negligence plays a central role in any Miami personal injury case. We have to provide documentation showing the liable party acted negligently in order to collect the compensation you need. There are four primary parts of proving negligence. We must collect and present evidence to show:
- The at-fault party had a legal duty of care toward you. By way of example, everyone who operates a motor vehicle on public streets has an obligation to obey the traffic laws.
- They failed in this responsibility. Failing to live up to a legal duty of care is negligence.
- You suffered a brain injury because of this negligence; and
- This accident caused you to suffer actual damages, like medical bills or lost wages.
For example, if your brain injury happened in a Miami car accident, we would need to prove the other driver broke the law, caused the accident, and that your injuries occurred during the crash. To do this, we would obtain the police report, interview eyewitnesses, request any surveillance video of the crash, get a copy of your medical records, call in an accident reconstruction team, and provide proof of all your accident-related expenses.
How Can a Lawyer Help Me File a Claim?
Traumatic brain injuries are expensive to treat. Having enough cash on hand can improve the quality of life for the victim and every family member. If you are like most families affected by a brain injury, you have a pile of bills for medical treatments, rehabilitation, and specialized therapies to help your loved one regain independence. If you cannot afford to pay these bills out-of-pocket, making ends meet is difficult.
This is where a lawyer is vital. We can almost always help our clients collect more compensation through their claims than they could get on their own without our counsel. We handle every aspect of your insurance claim so you can focus on helping your family recover.
We have experts who can help us determine the full value of your claim and put a price tag on the future care needs of your loved one. We can also collect the evidence necessary to prove negligence and use it to support our settlement negotiations with the liable party or their insurance company. With us on your side, you can rest comfortably knowing we will fight aggressively for the maximum compensation available in your case.
Potential Complications of Traumatic Brain Injury
Mayo Clinic explains what can happen to a person after a traumatic brain injury (TBI). Beginning immediately or soon after the TBI, the person could slip into an altered state of consciousness that could include:
- Coma for a few days or weeks
- Vegetative state that could become permanent
- Minimally conscious state after a coma or vegetative state
- Brain death, which is irreversible
An individual can experience many different physical complications after a TBI, like:
- Seizures, soon after the head injury or years later. If the person continues to have seizures, they have post-traumatic epilepsy.
- Headaches. Many people experience this complication after a TBI. The frequent headaches can drag on for months.
- Stroke, blood clots, or other complications from damage to blood vessels in the brain from the injury.
- Dizziness and vertigo can develop after a moderate to severe head injury.
Some examples of intellectual challenges after a TBI include:
- Cognitive issues with memory, concentration, and learning
- Executive functioning struggles with organization, problem-solving, and multitasking.
The injured person might experience communication challenges, struggle to speak or understand what other people say, or have difficulty reading or writing. Also, an individual could experience changes in behavior, emotion, and moods. Some people have double vision or persistent ringing in the ears. In short, the complications from a TBI can make work impossible and life miserable.
Client Reviews Tell the Story
We work hard to make things easy for our clients. Here are a few reviews our clients have written about the quality of service we deliver:
- “Anidjar & Levine is a great law firm. They gave us a free consultation over the phone and we were able to resolve our case easily… Keep up the good work guys!” – 5 stars – Kharmen W.
- “I had such an amazing experience here! Jonathan Holtz was my attorney and I could not have asked for a better person to take my case. He was very responsive and did a great job of keeping me informed! I would highly recommend letting them be your attorney.” – 5 stars – Sarah A.
- “Words cannot express how grateful we are to Andijar & Levine for everything they have done for us…We were both injured and without a car since it was totaled in the crash so Andijar & Levine sent one of their representatives name Charlie to our home to get the process started. Charlie was very professional and reassured us that everything was going to be fine.” – 5 stars – Jessica D.
Let us help you with your brain injury case. You deserve the personalized treatment that we provide for our clients.
Contact the Law Offices of Anidjar & Levine Today for a Free Case Evaluation.
At the Law Offices of Anidjar & Levine, our lawyers understand the complexities of these claims and how future care costs can dramatically affect their value. Call us today to schedule your complimentary consultation and case analysis with a Miami brain injury attorney.
We Can Help.
