All posts in Personal Injury

What should you do if you are seriously injured in a motorcycle accident

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Call 911 and Ask for Help

If you are involved in a motorcycle accident, either you or someone at the scene should call 911. A police officer will be dispatched to the scene of the accident. If there are injuries, EMS and/or paramedics will be dispatched.

If you are one of the parties injured, stay calm. If you have spilled off your motorcycle, do not get up. A quick assessment by a medical professional will ascertain if you should be transported directly to an emergency room. If your injury is not serious, you may be able to get up and move around.

If a passenger on your motorcycle is injured and you are not, stay on hand to calm the passenger and provide the medical professional with as much information about the person as you can. For example, does the passenger have a heart condition or other medical condition?

Get Contact Information

If possible, once you are stabilized, ask any other driver involved in the accident for the following information:

Name, address, and phone number
Drivers license and license plate number
Insurance company name and phone number
Were there witnesses to the accident? If yes, ask for their contact information also. Did anyone take photos or a video of the accident? This evidence should be preserved and provided if you intend to sue the person who caused your accident.

The Denver personal injury lawyers at the firm represent all types of injured clients, but specialize in commercial truck accidents. Hundreds of innocent automobile and motorcycle drivers and passengers are injured and killed in accidents resulting from negligence by the truck driver or their employers. Since 1984, the lawyers at Bell & Pollock, PC, have been helping people recover full and fair money damages after suffering a serious injury or losing a family member in a commercial truck accident. We can meet with you anywhere, including your home, hospital room or office to find out how your personal injury has affected you and your family.

Check Whether You Are Eligible For Personal Injury Compensation Claim

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Personal injury compensation is availed through a legal procedure that is designed to benefit a sufferer of an accident. In most cases, the claimant gets a monetary package as compensation. The amount differs according to several deciding factors. The injured party gets other benefits as well. Calculating compensation claims is not an easy task although. All personal injury claims come with a predefined compensation package. Before you go to the court for claiming compensation, you must ensure few things. Firstly, your claims should be 100% unquestionable. Secondly, you must collect all the evidences from the accident venue. Thirdly, you must appoint a good solicitor as the accused party is most likely to appoint someone with years of proven track records.

Determinants of Compensation Package
Several factors determine the compensation claims nature and the amount of compensation. Of these, five major factors are debriefed for your further reference:

Personal Injury: This is one of the prime and most evident factors that determines whether someone is eligible for a compensation claim or not. When you face an accident, you are most likely to get injury on your body. Though the intensity of the injury is generally measured by the physicians, the court will finally decide on how much claim amount you are entitled to.

Property Loss: An accident also results in property loss. It may be the car you were driving, the bike you rode on or simply the cloths that you were wearing at the time of accident. For replacing or repairing these properties, an injured party gets entitled to a certain compensation claim amount.

Medical disbursement: If you get serious injuries due to some accident, you have to undergo a treatment, may need a surgery and may need to hire a nurse afterwards. All these medical expenses will be included in the compensation package allotted to you.

Loss of working days: Loss of working days results in loss of income. If its not a workplace accident, your employer is not bound to give you the salary for the lost working days. Its then the accused partys responsibility to give you the exact amount lost due to your inability to go to your workplace.

Emotional Loss: Accidents cause mental disorders as well. If you lose someone close in the accident you survived from, you are most likely to go through a traumatic phase. Good personal injury compensation claim solicitors ensure that you get a compensation for emotional pain as well.

The Role Of Personal Injury Claims In Motor Vehicle Accidents

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It is as traumatizing experience for a person when it comes to being involved in a motor vehicle accident particularly one where personal injury is concerned.

Concerns flood your head as both your vehicle and yourself are often in need of repair, in many cases very severe repair. You exchange insurance information, file police reports and even contact a local shop to aid repair your vehicle as you seek medical attention. At first the insurance companies seem more than happy to aid you in your unfortunate situation. They look into the damage of your car, take an assessment of your personal injuries and promise to get back to you. Only to later come back with some ridiculously small number that they believe in their analysis is more than enough to compensate you for your personal injury.

While many insurance companies supply consumers with the image that theyre designed to aid drivers, the reality is that insurance is a high profit industry. The less a company has to pay on personal injury claims the better their profit numbers would be at the conclusion of their fiscal year. So they get thousands of individuals to pay monthly fees to keep their insurance just to use that money to fight victims of personal injury so that they can save a lot more cash in the end.

Few people will question the cost effectiveness of paying attorneys versus paying personal injury claims but what ought to be understood is that personal injury isnt a quick fix. Many times these injuries demand years of medical treatments and the one time offer the insurance company provides the victim isnt available to be extended when you run out of money.

When you are a victim of personal injury as a result of a motor vehicle accident, one of the best steps you could take is to find the very best personal injury lawyers. Remember that when you are working with insurance companies, they are trying to keep their profits and any payout which is provided to youll tarnish their numbers.

Furthermore, they have a team of highly paid attorneys which are paid through your month to month fees for the purpose of fighting any personal injury claims you submit. It might seem odd that youre paying the people that are fighting your claim but this is how the system works and why you should seek the assistance of personal injury lawyers. Personal injury is a traumatic time and while you are in that traumatic state it is probably the time an insurance company will make their efforts to pay you off.

Personal Injury Laws & Protection Benefits In Maryland

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The law regarding pain and suffering awards differs from state to state. Personal injury law of Maryland protects victims who are harmed by the failure of another to do or not do something that causes injury. An injury claim can be filed for injury incurred by an individual either physically or mentally, and it can sometimes include damage to property. If you were involved in the same in Maryland, you can contact some good Personal Injury lawyer in Maryland before signing any forms or speaking to the insurance company.

Why you need an attorney to help with a such cases?

Personal injury cases, unlike some other areas of the law, are matters that are difficult to handle on your own and there are many attorneys in Maryland willing to handle the cases. Here are some reasons why you need an attorney to help with such a case:
There are many different laws that may apply
You will need expert witnesses and evidence
You will need to use “discovery”, i.e. special set of legal rules and tools that will be used to find out information from the people, agencies or companies that you will sue.
Expert lawyers can settle your case even without a court hearing

Liability and Damages

Liability and damage are the two basic elements in any personal injury case. When you reach your attorney, first of all he or she will have to prove that the other person was negligent. Then only any damage recovery could be filed. Once this issue is resolved, the amount of damages becomes important.

Grounds of Personal Injury Claims

For claiming damage in such claims, establishing liability and damage becomes very important. Liability and damages can be established on several bases:

Negligence
A case of negligence could be filed when the injury happened due to the failure or omission of another. This is where the defendant is accused of causing the injury by failing to prevent it. For instance, an accusation that a property owner failed to clear ice off a sidewalk is case of negligence on the part of the property owner that could cause severe or minor injury to others. Another example would be someone who was speeding and caused an accident.

Intentional Wrong
Intentional wrongs also causes injury and the defendant could be made liable to pay. However, it can sometimes be brought as civil, personal injury claims apart from any criminal charges the defendant may be facing.

Types of Personal Injury Cases

Although, the list presented here is not all-inclusive, but it offers examples of the types of cases that may be considered for such claims.
Maryland Slip and fall injury
Maryland Nursing home negligence
Maryland Automobile accident
Maryland Defective product injury
Exposure to toxic material
Maryland Medical malpractice
Maryland and DC Wrongful death
Maryland Drug injury
Maryland job injury caused by another
Maryland Dog bite case

Things to Look For When Choosing a Personal Injury Lawyer

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Choosing a personal injury attorney is a very important decision. Hiring a personal injury lawyer who is a good match for you as a client will make the process of conducting a lawsuit less difficult, for client and attorney alike. A personal injury attorney may specialize in one area of personal injury law or may practice law generally. For example, an auto accident lawyer may specialize only in cases dealing with injuries resulting from automobile accidents. Alternatively, a personal injury lawyer could specialize in something as specific as medical malpractice, and thus only take cases against doctors or medical professionals. Keep the list below in mind when choosing a personal injury or auto accident lawyer to represent you:

1. Make sure the attorney is licensed to practice in your state
This one seems self-explanatory but is very important. Attorneys are licensed to practice law in a given state by the bar association in that state. An attorney who is not licensed to practice in the state in which the lawsuit arises cannot represent you. Be sure to double check in which states the attorney is licensed to practice law and make sure your state is listed.

2. Check the lawyer’s specialty
Depending on the nature of your claim, check with the attorney with respect to what his/her specialty is. If you have a slip and fall case, ask your attorney how many cases like yours he/she has taken and what the outcomes were. If your lawyer has never taken that type of case, you may want to look elsewhere or seek out a specialist.

3. Take notice of your attorney’s personality
This one is less obvious and is often overlooked when choosing a lawyer. Lawsuits take an extremely long time to conduct, often stretching over multiple years. That means that you as a client are going to have a large amount of contact with your attorney over the course of the lawsuit. Make sure you have an understanding over the amount and frequency of things like follow-up calls and meetings to avoid client dissatisfaction.

4. Good bar standing
Check your attorney’s peer ratings on any reputable attorney rating website. Check with your state bar association to ensure that your lawyer is in good standing with no disciplinary proceedings against them.

5. Fee agreements
Make sure you have a clear understanding of how the lawyer collects his/her fees BEFORE engaging the lawyer for representation. Lawyers have very different ways of charging clients from retainers to contingency agreements so check with your lawyer to see how he/she charges and whether their method is acceptable to you.