What you should know about personal Injury

Personal Injury Lawyer in Charleston WV - Pat Jacobs

In this video Pat Jacobs goes into detail about personal injury. Take a moment and listen as we discuss our top asked questions when it comes to personal injury.

 

Well, hey Pat. Thanks for sitting down with us today. We’re excited to talk to you. Thank you. Well, great. Well, can you just start off by telling us a little bit about what personal injury is? Yes personal injury is anytime you are injured and it’s the fault of a third party – someone else. Now that third party we always think it’s another person but it could be the actions of a corporation, company, but the most frequent personal injuries involve car wrecks, slipping and falling or having something fall on you at a retail store. But car wrecks is number one. But there are some significant personal injuries people need to be aware of that they may have an action for that are done by companies with medical devices prescription medications, or just consumer products of point to Roundup and Talc Powder those both cause cancer with their usage. If you have any of those problems, you can feel free to call Jacobs Law Office. But, also, from bad water. Sometimes West Virginia¹ Water Company, lets their infrastructure go bad or a private Public Service Commission and people get Legionnaires Disease. If that would ever happen to you, we handle cases like that. But those are personal injuries that you would sustain and they’re all caused by a third party company as opposed to an individual with a result in injury. Okay. Yeah. So how would I know when to contact you then if I had any of these injuries? If you are the victim of of a personal injury any type or you think you are, just call Jacobs Law Office with any questions you may have, and we can guide you. Obviously, if you’re in a car wreck, and you were injured, got medical treatment, we can take care of that and the sooner the better because the sooner we can get on the case, we can start gathering information about how you sustained the personal injury and what your damages are and point you in the direction of getting medical treatment that will help heal you, and cure you, and get you better. But if you suspect some type – you’ve used talc powder or any other kind of medical device problem – you can call our office and we can answer questions. We know what the injuries that those products are causing and we can help you and give you advice and give you a consultation and point you in the right direction on what to do. So how serious would an injury need to be to file for a personal injury lawsuit? The injury needs to be more than just a scrape or a bruise. And what I tell people when I’m talking to them on the phone after say a car wreck is that if they’ve been in a car wreck and they’re calling me two weeks later. They haven’t been to the doctor. That’s probably not going to be one that you’re going to want to pursue. And the sooner the sooner you get treatment after a car wreck or any specific injury, the better your case will be. Much better it will be because injuries are based the valuation of the settlement of them or jury verdicts is based on medical treatment and the consistency of it and how soon you get it. And the sooner you get it, most people think you must be really injured because if you’re in a car wreck and you break your leg, they know they’ll take you by ambulance to the hospital. That’s a serious injury. So that’s what they’re judging all injuries by. People who are in a car wreck they’re immediately taken to the hospital by ambulance. That is a serious injury. And if you’re trying to convince a jury or an adjuster that oh, well, I got hurt on June 1, but I didn’t get a medical check until June 20th or immediately thinking but you must have not been injured very badly. So the seriousness of the injury determines if the case is even more filing, then. Yes. Yes. Definitely the seriousness of it because there are expenses. There’s filing fees and you have to have doctors come forward and give depositions that have treated you. So you have to spend money and in order to get money for your medical bills, your pain and suffering, your noise and inconvenience, the loss of enjoyment of life, then you need to have some serious treatment. So if I were to file a lawsuit and lost, am I responsible for the cost of it? No, we as the attorney take all cases on contingency fee. We don’t get paid anything unless we win you money. And if we lose the case, then we’re responsible for all the costs that we advance and we don’t get paid any attorney fee. We have to absorb all that ourselves. Will I go to trial for my personal injury case? Odds are if we were gambling, we’d say no. We gamble no. Because over 90% of cases – personal injury cases – settle out of court. What would be my role in the lawsuit? What would be expected of me? We would expect for you to give us accurate and truthful information. We want you to get regular consistent and good medical treatment. We want you to follow our advice along those lines, and one of the most key important facts now in all personal injury cases is stay off of Facebook and all social media Twitter and Instagram. Don’t be posting. I’ll give you – you’re injured you want to say, “Hey, you know, I couldn’t walk more than a hundred feet or I couldn’t, you know, sit for more than a couple of hours because my back and neck was killing me” and then post pictures during hunting season of hunting and killing a bear and drag it out of the forrest on Facebook. You want to avoid everything posted on Facebook. So not just details about the case just in general avoid… Oh, yes very much so. In general, you just want to stay off of Facebook and all social media. Well great. Well last question. How long does a personal injury case typically last? And that’s a very tough question because it first depends on the length of the treatment. Oh, okay. Yeah, you don’t you can’t settle or even think about settling a case until the treatment is completed. So I mean if there’s been surgery yet have follow-up medical care and follow-up with the surgeon. If there’s a soft tissue injury with no surgery you go through going to see a chiropractor or physical therapy and that could take several months. So it really depends on the medical treatment, but once the medical treatment is completed then we immediately put together all the medical records and the medical bills and submit a proposed settlement to the insurance company.