Norfolk-Portsmouth Personal Injury Lawyer - Head & Brain Injuries

Experienced Injury Lawyers in a Navy/Military Town: Why Navy/Military Families Need Top Navy/Military Town Injury Lawyers

John Cooper — Thu, 18 Jun 2009 18:48:00 GMT

The Virginian-Pilot wrote about military members recovering from Traumatic Brain Injuries (TBI) due to battle-related injuries...and car accidents. In a Navy/Military area such as Hampton Roads, Virginia (VA) the chances of a military member getting in a car accident or simply suffering an injury is higher than other parts of the country. This is why it’s important to consult with a top Navy/Military town injury lawyer when/if an accident occurs.

If you’re a military member who’s been in an accident or injured, or you know a military member who’s suffered an injury, you need the best legal advice possible. Someone suffering from TBI or any injury deserves proper representation, especially our brave men and women who serve and protect our country.

I wrote about the importance of top legal advice and representation for military members and their families. My firm – Shapiro, Cooper, Lewis, & Appleton – has represented numerous clients affiliated with the military suffering horrendous injuries. This experience is vital because compiling the necessary records and information to file a claim and develop a case for a client affiliated with the military is different from a civilian. It’s more challenging to obtain medical records and documents of that nature. The lawyer needs to understand the processes in order to expedite the retrieval of this essential information.

An example of our experience includes my colleague Emily Mapp Brannon representing a member of the Navy who suffered a serious eye injury by a drunken patron at a bar. Mrs. Brannon stated, “Many personal injury attorneys would not take a case like this…[but] I knew that my client would likely be disabled from the military in the future-at some time and would possibly lose his career/job as a result of the bar/nightclub's negligence and the violent acts of the drunken customer.”

Our attorneys care about the long-term health of our military men and women.

Another example, my colleague Jim Lewis also represented a member of the Navy when the serviceman suffered severe low back pain after being rear-end collision in a car accident.

Clearly, our firm possesses the requisite experience and legal expertise to represent military personnel and their families. These heroic individuals deserve the very best representation possible after enduring a serious injury.

About the Editors: Shapiro, Cooper Lewis & Appleton personal injury law firm is based in Virginia (VA), near the NE North Carolina (NC) border and handles car,truck,railroad, and medical negligence cases and more. Our lawyers proudly edit the Virginia Beach Injuryboard, Norfolk Injuryboard, and Northeast North Carolina Injuryboard as a pro bono public information service. Lawyers licensed in: VA, NC, SC, WV, DC, KY.

Originally posted at InjuryBoard by John Cooper

Workers Suffering From Brain Injuries Deserve Equal Compensation Rights

Jim Lewis — Tue, 26 May 2009 15:36:00 GMT

You’re better off dying than suffering a brain injury in the state of Virginia (VA). This is the opinion shared by State Sen. Richard Stuart and many others, according to The Virginian-Pilot.

A heart-wrenching example is Art Pierce, a truck driver who, in 2006, suffered a traumatic brain injury in Stafford, Virginia (VA). His family, including his wife Claire Pierce, believes he suffered the injury after falling from a dump truck he was trying to fix, but no one saw him fall and Art was unable to testify at a hearing.

He never recovered from the injury and died in 2008.

Workers' compensation claims made on behalf of workers who die of other on-the-job injuries are routinely given the benefit of the doubt in hearings and other proceedings.

This is completely unfair and imbalanced. A traumatic brain injury can leave a person incapacitated for years and/or eventually lead to death, just like what happened to Art Pierce. The families of these individuals deserve equal compensation. Art Pierce’s family deserves compensation. The law needs to change.

Unfortunately, SB821, the bill focused on changing the current law was defeated due to special interests and lobbyists for insurance companies and other business groups.

Our firm has battled with insurance companies and business groups aiming to deny proper compensation for brain injuries and related head trauma. As a personal injury lawyer focused on ensuring brain injury victims receive proper compensation, I recently attended the 2009 Litigation Strategies Seminar put on by the Brain Injury Association of America in Las Vegas, Nevada. Because our firm regularly goes to the best attorney conferences, we are aware of the latest medical science and trial tactics to get maximum compensation for our clients who have suffered a blow to the head or a cracked skull in car and truck accidents.

We’re proud to have a track record of success in cases like these. For example, our firm won the largest personal injury verdict in Virginia (VA) history and the case revolved around an individual who suffered a traumatic brain injury.

If politicians continue to shirk their responsibility to make the laws fair, we’ll remain focused on keeping these companies honest by fighting them in the courtroom and ensuring justice to citizens afflicted with traumatic head injuries.

Originally posted at InjuryBoard by Jim Lewis

Virginia (VA) Woman Suffers Brain Injury Caused by Teenagers in Automobile Collision

John Cooper — Fri, 06 Jul 2007 15:34:24 GMT

According to an article in the Virginia Lawyers Weekly, a nurse from Falls Church, Virginia (VA), named Molly Raymond, suffered mild brain injury after being hit by two cars, both driven by teenagers. Because of the brain injury, she has no longer been able to work or continue her regular activities.

The lawsuit from this accident was pending in the Fairfax, Virginia (VA) Circuit Court. The insurance company lawyers stated that since there was no evidence of brain damage in her scans, she only had a psychological issue. As a Virginia (VA) personal injury attorney for decades, I know that this argument is misleading as scans often don't show damage to the brain, just as a regular x-ray does not show damage to the spinal discs which are soft material. Raymond's doctor testified that she had seen him for a neck injury, involving the accident, and she had no recollection of the meeting. The jury awarded a verdict in the amount of 2 million on May 11, 2007.

For more information on this subject, please refer to our section on Head and Brain Injuries.

Originally posted at InjuryBoard by John Cooper

Brain Injury: The Walking Wounded

John Cooper — Thu, 03 May 2007 13:59:00 GMT

A recent medical study of professional football players has showed that brain injury is a more significant problem, than thought. However, brain injury has probably been ignored or down played in the NFL and the medical community for a long time. Because brain injury is not always as obvious as some kind of a broken bone, it is easier to forget about or treat the injury as less than a real problem. This recent study showed that there is a major loss of function that occurs to football players who have repeated concussions over the course of a career. These players are the walking wounded. They walk around and look relatively normal, but their brains have been hurt and it has real effects on their lives.

In the field of personal injury law, we have been paying more attention to brain injuries recently. Other names for this trauma include closed head injury or post concussive syndrome. Whatever label is used by the doctors, this injury, which often results from automobile accidents, is very serious. The brain, itself, is soft like jelly and is encased in a hard structure, the skull, which is like a box with sharp points facing inward. If you take that box with jelly inside and shake it violently, there is going to be some tearing of the jelly. This tearing happens on a microscopic level. It can occur even without the head hitting a particular object like a windshield during a car wreck. Just the violent back and forth whiplash movement in a typical rear ender automobile accident may cause brain injury.

One of the problems with diagnosing brain injury is that it may not be immediately obvious at the emergency room or to the doctors just after the automobile accident. For example, even if a CAT scan is run, which is the normal way to look at the brain, this will not necessarily show the kind of tearing at the microscopic level which occurs in such injuries. Although sometimes there will be some obvious internal bleeding in the brain on a CAT scan, it is also just as common that brain injury is missed at that emergency room juncture. Typical questions asked of the person in the automobile accident like "did you lose consciousness" are fairly useless. If you, in fact, lose consciousness, you may not know or remember it. Most typically, the patient, after being seen in the emergency room, is given a set of instruction sheets about concussion and that is the end of it. Unless the patient or their family brings the possibility of brain injury to the attention of the treating physicians, it may well be ignored.

Ultimately, the brain injury has got to be diagnosed by a physician, typically a neurologist. The complex symptoms from a brain injury can often be confused for other medical problems. For example, some of the symptoms of a brain injury are headaches, memory loss, loss of concentration, irritability, depression, and other somewhat vague or diffuse symptoms which a family doctor or internist may not treat as coming from the automobile accident and a potential brain injury. Often, it takes a while for the patient and their family to realize that there is something more going on than the usual problems associated with a car wreck. Hopefully, the person who has suffered a brain injury gets in the hands of a neuropsychologist who is trained to determine if a brain injury has occurred. In Virginia, there is only one MD who has specialization in treating brain injuries and is also a psychiatrist. That doctor is named Dr. Greg O'Shannick. He is so busy that it is very difficult to get in to see him even if the person wants to travel to Richmond, Virginia, to get treatment. However, I have seen Dr. O'Shannick work miracles by knowing exactly the right treatment to give people with brain injuries that can greatly lessen their suffering.

Sometimes I, as the personal injury attorney, am called upon to help the client in an automobile accident case to realize that they may have a brain injury. Although I typically try to stay out of medical decisions for my clients who have been involved in car wrecks, this is one area where some attorney involvement may be required. Unlike knowing to go to an orthopedist for a bone injury, most typical people who have not been involved in a serious car wreck before may not realize that brain injuries are a real problem and are treated by certain limited medical specialists. More information about brain injury in Virginia (VA) can be found at www.biav.net, the site for the Brain Injury Association of Virginia (VA).

Originally posted at InjuryBoard by John Cooper

A Hospital Is No Place For A Sick Person

John Cooper — Fri, 13 Oct 2006 12:16:04 GMT

We have all heard a similar joke, even from health care providers, that the last place you want to be if you are sick is the hospital.

Hospitals are dangerous places. In addition to infections, there are many other dangers of injury and death posed by hospitals that are preventable. An independent agency has determined that nearly a hundred thousand people die each year because of medical error in hospitals. These cases can arise from such mistakes as the improper administration of medication. Injuries in hosptials also arise from other human errors such as cutting on the wrong side of the body, or leaving surgical instruments such as sponges in a patient after an operation. Most of the deaths and injuries caused by human error in hospitals probably goes unreported and unaddressed. Only when the patient is catastrophically injured are families of the victim likely to contact a personal injury lawyer to find out what their rights are. Despite the staggering amount of risk posed to patients, hospitals have been slow to adopt measures to prevent medical errors that injure patients. In that sense, medical malpractice litigation has a goal, as a second goal after that of compensating the injured person, of increasing the pressure on hospitals and the medical community to improve patient safety. These types of claims can be a strong incentive for hospitals to change.

If you or a loved one has been hurt through medical negligence inside or outside of the hospital, please consider calling an attorney who is experienced in medical malpractice. Our firm has handled numerous cases of human error in the hospital setting. Particularly when a catastrophic and permanent injury has occurred, it is critical to contact a qualified attorney as soon as possible. As with other kinds of injury cases, the client does not owe us anything for our time unless and until we obtain a recovery for that person. In this way, your injury law firm has to make sure that the case is really one that is worth pursuing. This takes time and money. The sooner you contact us, the easier it will be for us to get a successful result for you. It never hurts to ask a question. I hope you will consider calling us if you have any questions in this area of medical negligence.

Originally posted at InjuryBoard by John Cooper