3 Reasons not to Take Medication after an Auto Accident?

FORWARD: You should always follow your doctor’s orders and the following advice is just that, advice, and not to be considered over any doctor recommendation.

If you go to the ER after a car wreck, they will probably give you some type of minor anti-inflammatory/pain reliever such as an IB Profen or Aleve. They will also send you home with some if you say you do not have any at home (of course they will charge you about $10 per pill). The reason why it is so important to take this initial medication is to relax your muscles so that your body can properly heal. (This is direct advice from ER physician). Since your body is in stress mode after the shock of an auto accident, then your muscles are tense and this tension interferes with the proper recovery of soft-tissue damage.

If your pain persists and you seek further treatment then the attending doctor will more than likely prescribe a stronger pain medication. However the following are some very important facts to be aware of concerning taking or not taking these:

1.Be advised that simply because your doctor says they are giving you a “PAIN” medication, they may   perhaps be giving you an “ANTIDEPRESSENT”. Today, it is common practice to use anti-depressants as a pain medication; however this is dangerous because of the associated side effects.

2.If you do not follow your doctor’s orders and refuse to take stronger medications, then your doctor will put in his/her report that “patient refused to follow doctor’s recommendation.” They could even label you as hostile or defiant and this could be used against you when seeking a settlement offer.

3. If you chose not to take pain medications with a reasonable explanation and have sought alternatives treatments provided by your doctor, the insurance company may make the argument that you were not really in pain if you were not taking pain medication.

What You CAN’T Say On The Witness Stand

The following is direct legal advise:

Just to emphasize: At trial you can’t talk about any settlement offers, or the mediation, or your frustrations with the insurance company. I do not want to give the defense anything that could be a basis for appeal or mistrial.

The trial will actually be simply about the damages and what it is worth: the injury which did not exist before the wreck and all the problems associated with the injuries / the pain and suffering / how the injuries have affected your lives, the medical treatment and bills.

9 Things You Need to Know Before Going to Court

1. Get a good night sleep. Your mind needs to be as sharp as possible to outthink the opposing counsel.

2. Where comfortable cloths, preferably in layers. If you get to cold and start shaking this will be viewed as fear and if you get to hot and start sweating this will be viewed as hostility.

3. Review medical bills, depositions, doctors’ reports as much as possible. You do not want to have any gap in your story or be a shady witness who appears to be lying

4. Rehearse responses to possible questions that the opposing counsel will maybe use. It never hurts to be overly prepared, but being under prepared could cost you greatly but emotionally, physically and financial.

5. Meet with your lawyer before hand and make sure that he/she is prepared.

Ask questions like:
I. What questions will you ask me?
II. What do you think I will be asked by opposing counsel?
III. What evidence will be presented?
IV. Will I be involved in the jury selection?
V. What does our closing look like?

6. If you will take part in the jury selection, have your lawyer explain the process so you will be prepared. This may happen very quickly in which you will be expected to give a quick reason why you want or do no want a particular person on the jury.

7. Remember that honesty is your best tool. You do not have to remember a script; just tell your life story of the pain, loss and trails you have already experienced.

8. Be aware that you are only allowed to answer the question which is being asked, but there is always a creative way of getting the truth in. How you word your response may be what determines if something is admissible in court. This is why practicing your responses may help you when you get on the stand and nerves try to overtake you.

9. Make sure you know the exact location of the court house, the appointed room and the time you are expected to be there. If this is your lawyers first time at the courthouse you may want to double check if they know where they are going as well. However, do this discreetly as you do not want your lawyer to get mad before trial.

Top Reasons Why Lawyers Don’t Like Smart People

If you are a person that likes to plan, ask questions, is somewhat smart, then more than likely you are not going to be liked by lawyers. People who have original thoughts of their own may out think their lawyer and this will make them look bad. Lawyers who have idiot clients can say anything to them and they will be believed whereas if a lawyer has a smart client they can see right through the incompetence. This means that your lawyer will actually have to do some work instead of hoodoo you with some legal lingo. They will have to answer questions that they might not know which will involve doing actual research.

TIP: Be aware if a lawyer says, “I’m not sure if you now this ….but …” and tries to bring you to school. They are demening your intelligence which is a common tactic of an incompetent person who will attempt to fool you with legal mumbo jumbo lingo.

Antidepressant Drugs Used For Pain Management After a Car Wreck

In my personal experience, after my auto accident, the neurologist I began seeing quickly wanted to prescribe me medication. He told me they were for pain management ONLY and would NOT assist in healing my injury. What he did not tell me was that what he prescribed me was an antidepressant drug. I was prescribed Lexapro and I believe Norpramin. Yes, I do understand that these antidepressant drugs tend to work best for pain associated with nerve damage, but he lead me to believe they were something they were not. This was scary for me. Antidepressants play a dual role and they can be very tricky to use.

I now a friend who was prescribe Elavil for the exact same symptoms and she began to experience serious side-effects including major weight gain. Now, your doctor will tell you that one drug might not be right for you and you will have to find this via trial and error and then you will have to determine the dose works best for your body with an experiment of taking more and then less of a drug.

I don’t know about you, but this seems very dangerous to me. If your own doctor does not know who, if, when, a drug will work and you have to be a Guinea pig to the drug, I am a bit skeptical of taking something that will NOT even help your pain, but ONLY manage it – per Dr. orders.

3 People Types who Get the Runaround from Insurance Company

If you are breathing – First of all, it is nearly a given that if you are breathing and you are attempting to get your insurance company to pay up, you will get the runaround. They will employ some tactic to get you to settle with the least amount of loss to their pockets and this will involve getting you to agree on an amount quick, but drawing out the payment process until the last hour.

HEY IF THEY GIVE YOU THE MONEY, THEY CAN’T MAKE ANY INTEREST OFF IT.

If you are a woman – I know this is a sexist statement, but I have found that there is great prejudice towards females when it comes to a situation in which you are negotiating. Whether you are buying a car, coming to an agreed price on selling an item or reaching a settlement, most times a male will have the more dominant advantage. Therefore, if you have the opportunity for your husband or male presence in your life be your voice for negotiation, you will more than likely be better off.

You might think that the victim card may be one to play and a female will have the greater advantage, but THIS IS NOT TRUE. Insurance personal are trained to leave ALL EMOTIONS out of the deal. I don’t know how, but they truly are trained to be cold blooded. But I guess you would be too if your job depended on it.

If you are young or look young – Going up against an inexperienced person is a plus for any type of negotiator. And most of the time if you are young it is true that you do not know your rights and might take an unfair settlement by being easily tricked to do so.

If you are insecure – If you do not speak with confidence or have any type of non-verbal behavior that suggest you are non-confrontational, this is a red flag that you can be taken advantage of. If you want to get any type of fair settlement you will have to overcome any type of insecurities or social challenges. Suck it up and it will pay off.

Take some Confidence Training if you have to.

4 Forbidden Things to Say On The Witness Stand?

I was so shocked to learn that there are certain things you cannot say on the witness stand. It was a great irony to me due to that you would think the courthouse is one of justice and truth. However, before going on the stand, my lawyer advised me of all of the facts I could not reveal in order for our case not to be considered as a mistrial. This included:

1. You were not allowed to mention how your insurance unfairly treated you even if this was the reason you did not initially seek treatment for your injuries.

2. You were not allowed to say that the insurance adjuster was unfair in dealing with your case and was not even offering a settlement that would cover only your medical bills and not to mention any pain an suffering or loss of wages.

3. Unless presented to the court prior to a certain date, you are not allowed to say the exact total of your recently incurred medical expenses. You were only allowed to claim what had been presented to the court by your lawyer and if they are not advising you correctly this is the reason for a lower settlement amount. The jury can only reward you money for the recovered damages that they are aware of. In my personal experienced over $20,000 worth of medical expenses were not properly presented before trail.

4. You are not allowed to account for what any doctors told you. The opposing counsel will object stating that you are not an expert witness. To get around this, just re-word your testimony by instead of saying “the doctor said” to “after the wreck I had …”.

So the truth is that there is not much you can say on the witness stand. So, how is justice to be served if you cannot attest to your loss of life, your pain and suffering, your complete medical bills and to the fact of your future medical expenses of surgery.

What You Need to Know About “New Money”

One thing that was quite confusing to me personally was why everybody (lawyer and insurance company) kept on saying this word “New Money”. And even when our lawyer explained what this concept, it took a little while to figure out what it really meant.

Basically ‘New Money” means that the offered amount is what you will get. If a settlement offer is made of $20,000 you will get $20,000 from the opposing side. However, you still have to deduct from this amount your lawyer fees and expenses. So, the insurance company is saying I will not ask for the cost of medical bills or any other expenses they have already paid. Basically, if they have paid $5,000 of medical you will not get only $15,000 ($20,000-$5,000) like you would if you went to trial and received a court decision.

SO BE AWARE: IF YOU GO TO COURT YOU DO NOT GET “NEW MONEY.”

But honestly I think this terminology is just another tactic to confuse the honest, innocent, common people.

Tactics Your Lawyer May Use To Get You to Settle

Remember that lawyers much prefer out of court settlements because this goes as a win on their record as opposed to rolling the dice and possibly having a loss in court.

 They may scare you will possible future fees of court, depositions, mediation, travel expenses etc, etc so that you will take the settlement. This is true especially if your lawyer knows your financial situation.

 If your lawyer is aware of financial struggles, they may attempt to use a settlement offer as an incentive for you to be able to pay your expensive and incurred medical bills so that you are not turned over to collectors and therefore having much greater expenses.

 Your lawyer may try to tell you that your case is not worth more than the settlement amount and you should quickly take the first offer. Remember, the quicker you take the offer, the quicker the lawyer gets paid and can move to their next victim.

 Time is money for a lawyer and they will most definitely attempt to convince you that if you do not take an out-of-court settlement then your case could possible draw out for years.

 After further review of your case and closer examination of your doctors’ reports it is their opinion that the opposing counseling has a better argument for a jury, so you should take the settlement offer.

 If your lawyer tells you they will go pro bono just to get you to settle, this is a big red flag that something is not right. Lawyers just don’t give up the opportunity to get paid.

 And if your lawyer says they are going to quite on you if you don’t settle this is an even bigger red flag and grounds for disbarment.

 Again your lawyer may use another type of scare tactic that there is a Statue of Limitations coming up and we will need to settle. Of course this is not true, but if you are not aware of the law, then you are overly trusting of your lawyer.

 They pay play the trust card in which they say I’m doing what’s in your best interest and just trust me because I have done this for “x” amount of years. So I’m telling you to settle.

 Or they may use their excessive knowledge and experience to point out that you don’t know what you are talking about and should take their advice. In a polite way, they are calling you an idiot.

If you feel that your lawyer is working against you and constantly trying to get you to settle, there is probably a reason. Perhaps they are incompetent and need to be fired, or they may be in a type of dual relationship with the apposing counseling. But regardless of the excuse, don’t be blinding by these overly used tactics. Only settle if you feel that it is in your best interest.

Top 8 Secretes of an Insurance Adjuster

I would personally hate to be an insurance adjuster. They are highly trained to get a quick settle for the least amount of money regardless of personal loss and damages.

They have many tricks up their sleeves including:

PROPERTY DAMAGES ASPECTS

1. Getting you to sign a document for the auto settlement but it is really a complete release. Meaning that they are not responsible for your personal injuries. Never sign anything in haste. Never sign any thing that says “GENERAL RELEASE”. Get a second opinion. And don’t sign it if it smells fishy.
2. They will catch you at awkward times like right before work, at the end of the office day when there is a rush to make a decision, or the day after the wreck when you are not thinking correctly.
3. They will attempt to get out of responsibility as quickly as possible and be very forceful and come close to threatening so that you will settle. Don’t worry. Slow things down as much as you would like.
4. They will use intimidating, unfamiliar legal terms so that you feel pressured to listen to them as an authority.

PERSONAL INJURY ASPECTS

5. They may indirectly attack that you are seeking treatment via a chiropractor; however they will always begin by saying something like “I can’t tell you what type of treatment to seek, but if you go to “X” type of treatment we do not guarantee coverage.
6. They will try to give you a somewhat tempting settlement before you are completing better.
7. They keep a great distance so that nothing becomes personal. They will not listen to your pain and suffering and disregard it as any part of any settlement offer.
8. The insurance adjuster may call your attending physician to negotiate your medical costs behind your back.