Any accident that results in damage to the spine has the potential to be a life-altering event. Even relatively minor spinal cord damage can take months of intensive medical and therapeutic treatment to recover from. More severe injuries can result in permanent paralysis that can fundamentally alter your personal and professional future.
Although financial restitution may not be able to restore you fully back to your pre-accident condition, pursuing civil litigation against the responsible person with the guidance of a skilled catastrophic injury attorney can be crucial to preserving your best interests. With help from a Copperas Cove spinal cord injury lawyer, you can better secure a favorable case result without running into any legal or procedural roadblocks.
The spinal cord is the central pathway that every nervous system signal passes through to or from the brain. Any damage to that pathway will cut off some or all communication between different body parts and the brain. Two factors primarily determine how severe a spinal cord injury is: how “complete” the damage is and where on the spinal cord it occurs.
“Complete” spinal cord injuries involve the spinal cord entirely severing at the injury site, resulting in total and permanent loss of all sensory and motor function below that point. By comparison, “incomplete” spinal cord injuries mean the spinal cord is slightly torn, twisted, or bruised. “Incomplete” injuries offer some prospects for future recovery, but not without extensive and expensive surgical intervention and physical therapy.
The location of damage to the spinal cord determines what body parts lose functionality. Injuries to the lower spine potentially result in paraplegia of the lower limbs, and injuries closer to the neck can cause quadriplegia of the whole body. A seasoned attorney in Copperas Cove can help demand fair restitution for the short-term and long-term impacts of any spinal cord accident.
Despite how unique severe spinal cord damage can be, people who sustain injuries must still prove someone else was at fault to recover financial compensation. In most cases, establishing that another person’s negligence was the direct cause of a back injury works the same as proving that negligence caused any other type of physical harm. The plaintiff must establish a duty of care, demonstrate that a breach of this duty occurred, and directly connect their losses and spinal cord damage to this breach of duty.
Unfortunately, the standard two-year filing deadline for personal injury claims set by Texas Civil Practice and Remedies Code §16.003 also applies to spinal accident claims. This short time frame can make recovering losses for spinal cord injuries challenging, especially without help from a knowledgeable lawyer in Copperas Cove.
Sustaining a spinal cord injury can be an overwhelming experience that may seem impossible to recover from. Even though financial compensation cannot erase the physical harm you have experienced, it can ensure you have the best possible quality of life despite your accident.
A capable Copperas Cove spinal cord injury lawyer could explain your options and offer preliminary legal advice during a private consultation. Call today to schedule yours.