Legal•Info

Construction Accidents And Spinal Cord Injury

There are a number of different injuries that can occur from construction accidents, and one of those injuries is spinal cord injury. Many construction workers have been injured in the past and no matter how hard companies work to drill safety techniques into their employees, accidents are accidents, and they will always happen.

This is not simply a matter of unforeseen circumstances actually happening at the site itself but rather also a matter of missing information in many of the safety courses. These courses are designed to teach people the proper safety techniques and other motivations, but what it fails to do is to discuss in any amount of detail the types of injuries that can occur. If courses did this then there would be more direct incentive for the workers to make absolutely sure that everything they did was safe, and this article attempts to facilitate that motivation by discussing construction accidents and spinal cord injury in more detail.

The spinal cord is the series of nerve endings that control bodily movements and disperse sensory information, protected by the spine that runs from the bottom of the skull to the lower back. When the spinal cord is injured, the results are different depending on the type of injury suffered. A typical spinal cord injury usually results in the loss of some kind of movement and depending on the specific parts of the cord that are affected a person might lose control of their legs or arms, or even their whole body. This type of condition is known as paralysis.

There are a number of different ways that a spinal cord injury might occur at the construction site. Any type of injury affecting that part of the body has the ability to cause paraplegia, quadriplegia, or paralysis, and in addition, any head injury might indirectly affect the spinal cord by causing damage to the brain.

Consider a head-first fall from a moderate height. It is perhaps not very likely that the person will be killed by the fall because the person will be wearing a hard hat which should protect against direct brain trauma. The reverberating shock, however, might cause indirect brain trauma which might then also have an effect on the spinal cord. This is indirect trauma but still a possibility of happening during this or any other incident involving the head.

There are a number of different methods that people choose in order to help themselves deal with spinal cord injury, and it is important to be aware of the options available to you at this point in time. Spinal injuries often lead to permanent results, and any ill effects you are suffering through because of it are going to be with you for the rest of your life. If you believe that the accident that caused your spinal cord injury was caused by unsafe working conditions then you should probably consider filing a lawsuit against your former employer.

In order to make sure you properly assess your options, it is important for you to discuss the situation with a lawyer. Tell them the whole story, answer any follow up questions they might have, and then listen to any suggestions they might share as to what you should do. Because of complicated laws, legal precedents, and other legal labyrinths, find a law firm that specializes in these types of accidents and has the results to back it up. It will be a very useful experience, and often the simple act of talking can help you deal with the situation.