Brain Injury Lawyer On TBI Education
As a brain injury lawyer (one of the various titles I go by as a personal injury attorney) I can tell you from personal experience with injured clients that brain injuries can have severe and devastating effects on those afflicted. While it’s disheartening to see anyone affected by brain damage it’s all the more so when a child is the victim. Children have entire lifetimes ahead of them and to imagine a life lived possibly with diminished cognitive abilities or loss of motor skills or impaired speech is sad. There really is no other word that applies.
Looking at some of the brain injury statistics on the National Institute of Child Health and Human Development (NICHD) it’s even sadder and angering that for children’s brain injuries in children younger than 5 assault is the main cause of TBI-related deaths.
Brain injury attorney urges helmets
When brain injuries are attributable to negligence is when a personal injury lawyer such as myself can step in and represent that injured minor. Indeed I’ve done so and feel a great sense of satisfaction when I can prove to a court or jury that a minor client did in fact suffer brain damage and that it was caused by facilitated by someone else, through negligence or otherwise. The most notable of my brain injury cases ended up in a multimillion dollar award to my client and for those interested you can read more about that case elsewhere on this site.
Because childhood brain injuries are so heartbreaking I wanted to emphasize (as the NICHD suggests) the steps we can all take to minimize or prevent the chances of children’s brain injuries. Some of these steps include:
1) Using a child safety seat when transporting a child in an automobile.
2) Be sure your child wears a helmet when riding a bicycle or skateboard and when playing contact sports (such as football or hockey)
3) For very young children NICHD suggests installing safety gates and window guards in your home.
4) Most important: NEVER shake or jolt a baby.
Most of these are common sense steps most of us know intuitively, but they always bear repeating since we all have a duty to look out for children whether we are their parents, guardians, teachers or even strangers. Preventing or avoiding that violent head movement that can lead to traumatic brain injury is the first and most important step. Trying to pursue justice for a child with a brain injury after the fact is always a substitute for never having been injured. Of course as a personal injury lawyer I will always do my best to see that my injured clients receive the full and fair compensation they are entitled to but the best option is never to have to go down this path in the first place.