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This is a list of our firm's case results. We can't guarantee you'll receive the same results, but we can guarantee we'll work tirelessly on your behalf and try to obtain the jury verdict/settlement you deserve.

DISCLAIMER: Please note that every case is different and these verdicts and settlements, while accurate, do not represent what we may obtain for you in your case.

Car Accident-Interstate Rear End Accident-Recovery for Future Medical Surgery Expenses (Va Beach, VA-I-264)

Car Accident-Interstate Rear End Accident-Recovery for future medical surgery expenses

Staff:

Richard N. Shapiro, Attorney

Roz Hughes, paralegal

Meg Cudden, Legal Assistant

Court: Virginia Beach Circuit Court

Results: $130,000 settlement-future medical expenses claimed for neck surgery

Date: February 2009

What happened:

Our urgent care medical assistant/client was operating a car when it was smashed in the rear at a high rate of speed by the other car driver who was suddenly changing lanes on interstate 264 in Virginia Beach,  Virginia (VA) . The at fault driver tried to change lanes at the last second but instead crashed into the back of our client’s car making the entire rear of the car a complete and total loss and causing serious injuries to our client driver who was simply slowing down due to heavy traffic ahead. Our client was transported  to the emergency room right away complaining of back and neck pain.

Our client worked in the medical field for an urgent care doctor’s practice handling medical intake duties. She treated with the doctors she worked for who eventually referred her to a neurosurgeon. Based on an MRI conducted on her neck, it was clear that she suffered from a disk protrusion/disk herniation in her cervical spine, caused by the serious wreck. The neurosurgeon told her that she was a surgical candidate, and would likely need the surgery within 5 years.  She also had the classic symptoms of tingling hands and occasional numbness which are one sign of a significant neck/cervical disc injury. However, our client wanted to avoid undergoing the neck/cervical surgery at all costs, as she was familiar with the difficult rehabilitation and the possible complications from such a significant surgery.

Key Strategy:

She missed very little time from work at the urgent care office but obviously had a serious neck injury and her medical expenses were about $8000. When I explained to our client the limitations of her recovery under insurance law, I explained that the only way to gain any compensation for the fact that she may need future neck surgery was to ask her doctors to give an opinion, to a reasonable degree of medical certainty, that she would need the neck surgery or we would not be able to obtain the recovery for the major surgery and physical therapy expenses in the courts. I explained that the second hurdle would be to convince an insurance company of the fair cost of that future surgery even though it had not been conducted, nor was it scheduled. Our client felt strongly that she should be entitled to recover the money for the future surgery given that her neck had no herniation injury prior to this accident. I agreed with her and told her that we needed to not only get the opinions I outlined from her neurosurgeon, but we would probably need a nurse consultant to find out what the current costs were for all of the associated surgical and medical expenses relating to this neck surgery, including the normal amount of physical therapy and other testing that would be required.

Accordingly, we retained a nurse consultant to establish the reasonable and necessary medical expense costs for a neck surgery, and we asked the nurse consultant to consult with the neurosurgeon on these issues. We obtained a full and complete report from the nurse consultant outlining the future medical expenses, and then we had to follow-up with our client’s doctor ourselves, obtain a telephone conference, and be sure the doctor agreed with all of the expenses and types of procedures outlined by the nurse consultant who had already spoken to this doctor's office.

This future expense report outlined over $200,000 in future medical expenses. While the suit was pending in Virginia Beach Circuit Court, our client still had not undergone the neck surgery but we maintained that the  driver who caused the crash was responsible for these medical expenses outlined by her surgeon. The defense argument was that our client had not undergone the surgery and it was about two years since the date of the accident.  During the lawsuit discovery phase, the “defendant” driver essentially admitted his fault, and our medical assistant client made an excellent witness as to the extent of her medical problems.

The results:

Prior to the lawsuit, we could not get the insurance company to offer more than $25,000 to settle this case. Once we filed the suit, obtained all of the reports that I outlined above, we eventually received a first $100,000 settlement offer from the “primary” insurance company that represented the driver that caused the crash. Fortunately, our client had access to two other different car insurance policies under what is called uninsured/under -insured to motorist coverage which covered her adult children, two who resided with her when the car accident occurred. Different states have different rules, but in Virginia, all of the available uninsured motorist coverages can be combined or stacked together and if they exceed the amount of the responsible driver’s total liability insurance, that becomes additional insurance that may apply to compensate the injured person/client. In this case, all of the uninsured motorist insurance coverage combined to  $200,000. We eventually settled the case for a total of $130,000, which three different insurance companies contributed to, in order to settle this case favorably for our client.

Our law firm has decades of experience in  hit-and-run, uninsured, underinsured motorist, and drunk driving car/truck accident cases. Please see other car accident case results on our website, and if we can assist you please fill in our quick contact form or call us toll-free today for a free consultation.

Awarded: $130,000.00

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