Handling A Work Comp Claim With Multiple Injuries

If you get burned by a hot piece of machinery or you slip and fracture your ankle on a staircase at work, you’ll have a pretty straightforward injury case on your hands because you’re dealing with an isolated injury. But what if your work accident caused damage to multiple areas of your body? These cases will be more involved, and you’ll have to navigate the system carefully if you want to earn a fair payout. In today’s blog, we discuss some of the best ways to handle an injury claim when you’re dealing with multiple injuries from one work accident.

Workers’ Compensation With Multiple Injuries

If you’re involved in a severe accident at work that leads to multiple injuries that require medical care, you’ll want to take some deliberate steps to give yourself the best chance at earning a fair workers’ compensation award. Here’s what we recommend:

1. Be Open With Your Doctor – First and foremost, you’re going to need to have your injuries assessed by a medical professional if you’re hoping to be eligible for workers’ compensation. During this examination, be very open and honest about the extent of your injuries. Don’t just mention the areas that hurt the most. If you’re dealing with head, back and ankle injuries, make sure your doctor notes all sources of pain. In order to collect compensation for all your injuries, they all need to be professionally documented. If you forgot to mention something or symptoms show up after your initial exam, reconnect with your provider.

2. Connect With A Lawyer– It will also be wise to bring a lawyer into the fold as soon as possible. The workers’ compensation system is complex even when an injury is pretty basic, but that gets amplified when you’re dealing with multiple injuries. You’d probably struggle to put an appropriate valuation to one injury, let alone multiple. Let your lawyer review your medical examination and use their experience to come up with a fair valuation to ask for in your injury claim. If you don’t know how to value your claim, you’ll likely leave some money on the table.

3. Be Patient – The workers’ compensation claims process isn’t exactly known for being swift, and that sentiment rings even truer when you have multiple injuries. The existence of one injury won’t validate all of your injuries, so expect that it will take a while for the insurance company to put together a fair offer for all of your injuries. Moreover, don’t be in a hurry to accept the first offer. The statistics show that first offers are typically much lower than a final settlement agreement, so be willing to play hardball with the insurance company, and that requires patience.

4. Consider Your Future– Finally, before you agree to any type of settlement that is offered, make sure that you talk with your attorney about how the award accounts for your future medical expenses. If you have multiple injuries, there’s a good chance that you may have some permanent disability associated with at least one injury. Ensure that future medical expenses and the impact this injury will have on your life is factored into any settlement or disability payment so that you aren’t shortchanged in the future if you need more care for your injuries.

It’s rarely a good idea to try to win your workers’ compensation case on your own, and that’s especially true if your accident caused multiple injuries. It can be easy to overlook some type of award or benefit that you may be eligible for and leave thousands of dollars or more on the table. Don’t leave compensation up to chance. Instead, focus on your health and your recovery while your lawyer goes to work on your behalf. Let us get you every penny you deserve from the insurance company after your work accident.

For more information on how we can help, or for answers to specific work injury questions you have, reach out to Dean and the team at Margolis Law Firm today at (952) 230-2700.