Back and Neck Pain After a Car Accident – What happen when your claims are denied?

September 16, 2019, Kitchener, Ontario

Posted by: Robert Deutschmann, Personal Injury Lawyer

Back pain is one of the most common complaints after a car accident. The sudden impact of a car crash causes serious jolts to your body. You may slam into the dashboard, the door, airbag, or the seat itself. The seatbelt locks up and causes more forces against your body, and finally the recoil from the impact also generates great force on your body and spine.  These can all cause damage to your neck and back. The damage may be temporary or permanent.

Muscle strains and whiplash are often dismissed as minor, but the pain is real and can be debilitating. Lumbar sprains are serious trauma causing ligaments, tendons and muscles to stretch out of shape and are often missed in preliminary examination. This and other trauma to the spine such as ruptured discs can result in herniated discs or spinal stenosis. Any sprains, or damage to the spine should be treated immediately to try to prevent long term damage, chronic pain, and permanent disability.

Proper diagnosis is essential, and most spinal injuries can be spotted on x-ray. Further investigation may require CT scans. Treatment may include muscle relaxants, heat and cold, anti-inflammatory, physiotherapy, spinal steroid injections, other medications or chiropractic care, or eventually surgery.

We have had many clients who walked away from seemingly ‘minor’ car accidents who have gone on to develop constant pain in their backs and necks. They have faced the long journey of intractable pain. They know how discouraging visiting the doctors over and over again can be.

This is all time consuming and can become very expensive. Insurance companies may balk at the costs or duration of therapy. They may even question if you are really injured. Insurance benefits may be denied, and in some cases STD (short term disability) and LTD (long term disability) claims or income replacement benefits are also declined. There are some employers that threaten to fire employees for being off injured too long.

The fight to get STD or LTD benefits from their employers when the car insurance won’t pay is frustrating and draining when you are already in despair. These are the lucky cases. For many, the option of LTD doesn’t even exist and they are left to fend for themselves trying to sort the finances and pay for drugs, treatments and uninsured tests. Time off work is often unpaid.

Our clients often come to us at this point. They have suffered in pain, in the face of rejection and financial insecurity. They need our help to get the benefits that they need and deserve in order to recover from their injuries and to be able to pay their bills. Thanks to our hard work many of our clients who had been denied benefits have gone on to receive coverage for treating their injuries and for their time away from work. They’ve been able to recover and go back to work.

It’s important to contact a lawyer as soon as possible after being injured in a car accident, or having your claims denied because there are time limits set on claims, and strict processes exist to make claims. Don’t jeopardize your future by delaying the call.

If you’ve had your long-term disability claim denied, or if you’ve been injured in an accident and had treatment of your injuries denied call us today.

About Deutschmann Law

Deutschmann Law serves South-Western Ontario with offices in Kitchener-Waterloo, Cambridge, Woodstock, Brantford, Stratford and Ayr. The law practice of Robert Deutschmann focuses almost exclusively in personal injury and disability insurance matters. For more information, please visit www.deutschmannlaw.com or call us at 1-519-742-7774.

It is important that you review your accident benefit file with one of our experienced personal injury / car accident lawyers to ensure that you obtain access to all your benefits which include, but are limited to, things like physiotherapy, income replacement benefits, vocational retraining and home modifications.