Maison Law of Merced stands with workers after they’ve suffered a debilitating brain injury in the workplace. We demand the maximum recovery support for victims from Workers’ Comp and their employers. Injured employees and their families should contact a skilled Workers’ Compensation lawyer and schedule a free consultation. It’s a no-risk way to determine what your head injury is worth and how to earn the most in benefits from California’s Division of Workers’ Compensation (DWC).
Do I Need a Lawyer After Suffering a Brain Injury on the Job?
One of the most important reasons you’d want a skilled Merced Workers’ Compensation Lawyer handling your case is to have the chance to earn much more in support than you could usually win on your own. This might be a critical difference when you face weeks or months of medical bills while trying to recover from a major head or brain injury.
In some cases, strong legal representation is also valuable protection when Workers’ Comp administrators try to devalue your injury. Or when an employer tries to shed blame and claim that your accident was your fault.
If you suffered a serious injury at work and lost more than a few days of work, it can pay to discuss your options with an attorney.
How Can My Workers’ Comp Lawyer Earn Me More?
The higher medical expenses that usually come along with head trauma will usually leave you fighting your employer’s Workers’ Compensation Insurance Provider just to get basic support.
Your lawyer provides these important benefits to earn you more:
- Secures Evidence: A skilled Merced Workers’ Compensation Lawyer secures the evidence needed to hold employers accountable. This is often evidence that you would have a hard time gaining access to.
- Presenting Your Case and Your Hardships: Your lawyer also presents your case to Workers’ Compensation administrators and judges and makes sure they get the complete facts in order to make a fair decision in your case.
- Experienced Negotiating Skills: Your Maison Law lawyer has experience dealing with major companies and giant insurance companies. We use our hard-earned skills at the negotiation table to win you more. If the DWC won’t cover the full scale of your injuries in a settlement, we will reject it on your behalf and demand more.
We also handle all of these sometimes frustrating steps in the Workers’ Compensation process while leaving you in peace to focus on healing and returning to work.
Talk to a lawyer if you feel you aren’t being treated fairly by your employer after an injury. Talk to a lawyer if you believe Workers’ Compensation won’t provide enough to pay all of your hospital expenses and cost-of-living expenses while you can’t work.
Resource for Injured Workers: The guidebook provided by the California Department of Industrial Relations (DIR) explains a few other reasons you may want to trust your case to a lawyer.
Head Injury Accident Dangers in Merced County
The owners of companies and corporations owe their employees more than just a paycheck. Under California labor laws, they are required to provide workers with safe workspaces. That means protection from the risk of dangerous blows to the head.
The risks can come in many forms in many different types of jobs. Construction workers may be struck by stuff falling overhead. Farmworkers might suffer head trauma after a strike from a fast-moving piece of farm equipment. Even office workers can suffer harm if they take a tumble down a stairwell in disrepair and hit their heads multiple times. Workers in warehouses may suffer a Traumatic Brain Injury (TBI) after taking a fall from a high platform.
Employers must provide training and safety equipment to prevent these frightening incidents. If they are negligent in these duties, they should be responsible for the cost of recovery when workers get hurt. All injured workers should be supported by Workers Comp, but they can be denied enough in financial assistance to pay all of their medical costs.
These are just some of the dangerous head injuries suffered in workplace accidents that might be treated at Mercy Medical Center in Merced:
- TBIs: A Traumatic Brain Injury is when the brain is injured due to something penetrating the skull and brain or a powerful jolt to the head that caused the brain to move. Serious TBIs might lead to seizures and a shortened lifespan. USC researchers report that TBIs change the brain structure in victims. Patients might experience memory deficits, have trouble making decisions, and endure problems with social interaction. A TBI might also increase the risk of Alzheimer’s later in life. These immediate hardships and difficulties expected in the years ahead must all be factored into any Workers’ Comp Settlement.
- Skull Fractures: Different parts of the skull may suffer a break, including the bones behind the face. One serious complication results when a piece of the broken bone pushes into the brain. Immediate surgery may be necessary.
- Brain Bleed: This is a type of stroke that results when a blood vessel bursts due to an accident or impact. Blood builds and increases in pressure, cutting off oxygen to the brain.
- Concussions: Concussions are considered a mild form of TBI, but the effects can be serious. Victims could have headaches for days. They might also have vision issues and suffer mood swings.
- Diffuse Axonal Damage: This is when nerve fibers in the brain are damaged due to a blow to the head. The brain is jostled back and forth in an accident, like a fall, and nerves are torn. Brain damage is possible.
Head injuries can affect victims for months or years. It’s only fair that employers back them up when they get hurt trying to accomplish work goals. This can mean temporary support while victims heal and can return to their jobs. It can also mean a lifetime of support if a patient suffers permanent brain damage. Maison Law Accident & Injury Lawyer is ready to help victims force a Workers’ Compensation insurance company to accept liability and assist patients financially for as long as necessary.
What Kinds of Things Can Earn Support in a TBI Workers’ Comp Claim?
Your attorney would be negotiating for the maximum in support so that you could pay all of the medical bills that had piled up since the accident. Your claim will include a list of everything you’ve been through with your injury and everything you’ve missed out on while being out of work.
The DIR Injured Worker’s Handbook goes over all the different types of compensation and benefits available through a claim.
This is just some of the factors that your Maison Law attorney will be demanding support for:
- Medical Care. Paid for by your employer, to help you recover from an injury or illness caused by work. This includes doctor visits and other treatment services, tests, medicines, equipment, and travel costs reasonably necessary to treat your injury.
- Temporary Disability Benefits. Payments if you lose wages because your injury prevents you from doing your usual job while recovering.
- Permanent Disability Benefits. Payments if you don’t recover completely and your injury causes a permanent loss of physical or mental function that a doctor can measure.
- Supplemental Job Displacement Benefit. A voucher to help pay for retraining or skill enhancement, including the cost of vocational therapy for you. These benefits are available to those who are eligible to receive permanent disability benefits, your employer doesn’t offer you work, and you don’t return to work for your employer. This benefit is available for workers injured in 2004 or later. If your injury also occurred in 2013 or later and you received a Supplemental Job Displacement Benefit, you may also be eligible for an additional, one-time payment under the Return-to-Work Supplement Program.
In general, workers’ compensation doesn’t cover the physical pain and the emotional trauma victims of violent accidents must often cope with. Victims may deal with PTSD symptoms after an accident around machinery or a structural collapse in a barn or warehouse. They may face chronic pain for years to come.
Your lawyer helps you decide if a lawsuit should be filed against an employer (including a state agency) to seek additional compensation for these very real hardships caused by a workplace injury. You and your lawyer may have to go beyond workers’ compensation to seek additional support for your mental health and to help seek additional support from an employer through a workplace injury lawsuit.
Frequently Asked Questions
Is there a deadline for reporting my brain injury to my company?
Yes. You must inform your manager or the company owner within a month of your injury. Alert them as soon as you can. If you wait, your case may be rejected and you won’t receive help with your medical costs.
How long can I wait to inform California Workers’ Compensation of my injury?
Victims can file a Workers’ Comp claim up to a year from the date of the accident. If a victim doesn’t know about the injury until later, the one-year countdown would begin on the date the injury was discovered.
Can undocumented workers receive Workers’ Compensation benefits in California?
Yes, their citizenship status doesn’t matter. California also prohibits employers from threatening or intimidating undocumented workers because they have reported an injury. A Workers’ Compensation Attorney will work to get all workers full benefits after accidents.
What if my employer threatens my job or threatens to retaliate after I report an accident?
California law forbids employers from going after workers who report unsafe conditions, injuries, or who ask for Workers’ Compensation support. Our lawyers will take quick legal action if employers try to intimidate or threaten a worker for reporting an injury. We file lawsuits if an employer fires an injured employee simply because they got hurt. This behavior is illegal.
Contact a Merced County Workers’ Compensation Attorney
The most important outcome is that you can count on the most support possible through Workers’ Compensation as you recover. A Merced Workers’ Compensation Lawyer provides the best chance to do that. Workers who are injured and who lose their ability to support their families must get every benefit possible now and in the future. Maison Law can help untangle the options and get injured workers on track to rebuild their lives and their careers.
There’s an easy way to find out which path offers you the fastest route to the support you and your family desperately need. Speak to Maison Law in a free, no-obligation consultation. We want to hear about what happened to you and then help you determine the best course of action for your family.
