Maryland Car Accident Attorney Blog
Being injured in a car, motorcycle or commercial truck accident is not so much a possibility as a certainty, depending on the speed at the time of the traffic collision, the number of cars or trucks involved and the conditions surrounding the wreck. As Maryland car, truck and motorcycle accident lawyers, my firm is built on the idea of helping individuals recover damages resulting from roadway accidents.
While property can be replaced, however, lives are more precious and more difficult to be made right following a devastating highway crash. Consider two of the more major types of physical injuries that can sideline a person for weeks or months, not to mention possibly for a lifetime. These include spinal cord and brain injuries. Of course, there are numerous types of neck, back and head injuries related to these two major types, but the seriousness of the bodily injury should never be underestimated.
Whether one is hurt here in Baltimore, over in Rockville, or somewhere in the District of Columbia, car, truck and even pedestrian incidents involving vehicular traffic can be just as life-threatening no matter where they occur. Given the sheer number of people hurt or killed in motor vehicle accidents, it’s no surprise that Maryland personal injury attorneys like our legal team hear of dozen of severe and near-fatal injury accidents every month.
Taking into account these two categories of serious bodily injuries that can occur in a passenger car or commercial trucking accident, we know from experience that medical treatment of these kinds of injuries can break a family’s savings in no time. In the case spinal cord injuries suffered in a traffic wreck, the seriousness of the accident can cause trauma to the cells that make up the spinal cord. If these cells become damaged — or if the nerve tracts (those delicate conduits that transmit control signals up and down a person’s spinal column to limbs and other parts of the body) are physically severed, it is an almost certainty that the victim will have a long recuperative period, with no guarantee of a full recovery.
The most common kind of spinal cord injury (or SCI as is known in medical circles) involves the compression of the spinal column, or in severe cases a spinal contusion (literally, a bruising of the spinal cord), all a result of pressure long the length of the spinal cord.) Another type of SCI includes central cord syndrome, in which damage can occur to the “corticospinal” tracts located in the cervical region. Lacerations, too, can result from a traumatic event such as a high-speed car accident, in which tearing or even severing of the nerve fibers can occur.
A symptom of such events can be a loss of sensation and reflex function below the point of injury. Such an injury can result in dysfunction of the victim’s bowel or bladder activities, or even loss or interruption of breathing ability. Paralysis, as well, can be a common result of a traumatic spinal cord injury; this includes the loss of muscle control and related voluntary movement. Indications of such damage can be indicated by muscle spasms, a sensitivity or painful response to various stimuli, and even sexual dysfunction.