Herniated Disc Personal Injury Cases

     Our injury lawyers handle herniated disc accident cases in Maryland and around the country. Below are frequently asked question about herniated disc cases and example MRI reports and operative notes in herniated disc cases.

What is a herniated disc?

     Spinal discs are round cushions that lie in between the vertebrae of the spinal column. These discs Herniated Discbasically act like shock absorbers between the vertebrae, cushioning them when we contort our bodies in everyday life. These discs have an external shell and a liquid substance in the middle. The metaphor we often use with juries in personal injury cases is that the discs are like jelly donuts. If a disc is injured as the result of the trauma of an auto accident, the "jelly" may leak out of the disc. If the inner core of the disc extrudes back into the spinal canal it may impact a nerve root. The weak spot in a disc is directly under the nerve root and a herniated disc can put great pressure on the nerve, which can cause pain to radiate throughout the person's body.

     Where the pain radiates to in the body depends on where the disc herniation occurs. When a patient has a symptomatic herniated disc, the pain is not in the disc area; rather, the disc herniation is pinching a nerve in the spine that causes 'radicular' pain. This radicular pain is typically described as a pain that shoots through the body, usually to one area in particular, since each nerve in the spine is connected to a particular area of the body. This pain can be nerve root pain, leg pain if the herniation is in the lumbar (back), or arm pain from a cervical (neck) herniated disc.

     A herniated disc is rarely diagnosed in the emergency room after an auto accident. This is because the disc is invisible on an x-ray. Accordingly, a patient typically needs a CT scan or magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) test so that a physician can pick up a disc herniation. A discography, myelography, or an electromyography are also used to diagnose herniated discs. It is worth noting that the experts agree that these diagnostic tests cannot diagnose the injury victim's pain. There is no clear cut correlation between the degree of the hernination and the patient pain symptoms because there are so many other variables involved.

What is a herniated disc case worth by settlement or at trial?

     Because our lawyers have successfully tried a number of herniated disc cases and have received national exposure for our jury verdicts in these cases, we receive at least once a week this inquiry: what is the settlement or trial value of my herniated disc injury that was caused by an auto accident? The answer, naturally, is that it depends on the injury. Some herniated disc injuries leave a patient in constant pain for the rest of their lives. These patients try traction, steroid injections, therapy and surgery and still find themselves in pain that will last a lifetime. Assuming (1) no question as to responsibility for the auto accident, (2) no preexisting injury or pre-accident degenerative disease, and (3) reasonable insurance coverage for the at-fault driver, the settlement value of these types of herniated disc cases are almost invariably six figure and sometimes even seven figure cases.

     The more complicated cases involve preexisting injuries. A favorite tactic of lawyers defending personal injury cases on behalf of the insurance companies involving herniated discs is pointing the finger at preexisting degenerative problems with a patient's spine such as spinal stenosis, osteoarthritis, and spondylolisthesis. Most of these are conditions that begin in many people in their early 30s. Therefore, it must be established that the patient's problems are not due to the degenerative condition, but to the trauma sustained in the accident.

     All of this begs the question of what happens when a person has a preexisting herniated disc or some type of degenerative changes and was asymptomatic (without symptoms) before the accident. There are two Maryland jury instructions on point: the susceptibility instruction (Maryland Pattern Jury Instruction 10:3) and aggravation of preexisting condition instruction (Maryland Pattern Jury Instruction 10:4). If you have either one of these issues, you and your attorney must be able to clearly articulate the difference between your problems and treatment before the auto accident and your current condition. If there is no difference in your condition after the accident, your chances of a substantial recovery diminish dramatically. On the other hand, if there is a notable difference in your way of life after the accident that would not have occurred in the absence of the auto accident, your chance of a quality settlement increases dramatically.

 

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