Dealing with an injury can be mentally, emotionally and financially straining on you. In addition to lost time and wages at work, the medical bills begin to pile up quickly. Anyone who’s been hospitalized can agree that a serious injury will seriously set you back-sometimes years of financial savings. In many cases the where the injury was caused by another’s recklessness or negligence, the victim has no choice but to recover their medical costs by filing a personal injury lawsuit. Once you see the statistics, you’ll understand exactly why.
According to the National Center for Injury Prevention and Control injuries account for over a third of all emergency room visits and accumulate over $80 billion a year in medical care costs.
A report published in The American Journal of Medicine states that medical bills cause over 60% of personal bankruptcies in the United States. That same study shows that about three-fourths of those bankrupt actually have health insurance.
Almost 46 million Americans do not have any health insurance at all. Even more upsetting is that most people who were uninsured in the last year are in working families. Of these uninsured Americans 58% were in families with at least one person working full-time.
Another study found approximately 41 percent of working age Americans currently have medical bill problems or are currently paying off medical debt. Among the problems reported in the survey: 28% are paying off medical bills over time and 27% of adults said they had problems paying or were unable to pay their bills in 2007.
The most expensive age group for injury victims was 45 to 64 year olds, averaging $11,100 in medical bills per injury hospitalization.
Serious injuries present much higher tabs for patients. According to an interview by Fox News, “a gunshot wound to the head, chest or abdomen” will cost $13,000 (at one particular hospital) the moment the victim comes in. From there the medical costs pile up based on the location and severity of the wound.
The most severe spinal cord injury bills range from $800,000 to over $1.8 million in medical bills, based on the age of the victim.
The Brain Association of Missouri reports that the cost of care for the average traumatic brain injury patient is around $151,000 in the first year alone.
Continued costs, rehabilitation prices and lost wages can put an injury victim in thousands of dollars of debt in a matter of weeks. Luckily, if your injury was caused by another person’s negligence you will be able to recover these costs through a personal injury lawsuit. For more information please contact a Brownsville personal injury attorney.
Jeff Davis is the Owner of the Davis law firm and a highly experienced Brownsville personal injury attorney. To find out more information about a Rio Grande Valley personal injury lawyer, please visit www.jeffdavislawfirm.com.