When victims of car accidents decide they don’t need medical attention after a collision, they may not realize how dangerous this choice is. A car accident is always a potentially harmful experience, because some serious injuries do not cause any pain or other symptoms that make them easy to identify. A victim with a serious or even life-threatening injury may not realize they need medical attention until the injury causes pain and potentially turns fatal.
Any time that you or someone you love experiences a car accident, you should go straight to a doctor or some other qualified medical professional who can give you a complete medical examination. If you have a delayed pain injury, the examination can identify it before it gets worse, saving time, money and, possibly, your life.
Emergency conditions
Injuries such as whiplash and head trauma are serious and debilitating, but rarely fatal. In contrast, internal bleeding and partial organ damage are often deadly. Internal bleeding involves damage to the circulatory system, and the site of the injury is vulnerable to infection. If the site of the injury grows infected, the infection can spread throughout the victim’s entire body through the bloodstream. Once an infection begins spreading, it becomes very difficult to treat.
Partial organ damage often doesn’t cause any pain at all, at least while the body attempts to heal the damage through its own processes. If the body succeeds in healing itself, the victim may never realize they suffered an injury in the first place, but if the body cannot heal the organ damage, it will shut the organ down permanently. In most cases, when one organ fails, all the other organs fail as well.
Both of these forms of delayed pain injury lead to painful, slow deaths, and should be avoided at all costs.
Protecting your rights while you recover
After any injury, your own health should always be your first concern. If you don’t make time to care for yourself and seek out the treatment you need, you may not get the chance once you realize something has gone terribly wrong. Unfortunately, medical care is now so expensive that many people avoid care that they need because they worry that they cannot afford to get help.
With a strong legal strategy, you can identify all your legal and medical options, and help ensure that you have the resources and support you need to receive the care you deserve. With proper care, you can focus your attention on recovery, while your rights and best interests remain protected.