If you were injured in an auto collision, you might be wondering exactly how a lawyer can help you. Here's how we can help.

If you were injured in an auto collision, you might be wondering exactly how a lawyer can help you--or whether it's a good idea to try to deal with the insurance company and settle the claim on your own. While much depends on the specifics and the complexity of your case, in general we can:

* communicate with the other driver’s insurance company

* obtain the necessary evidence with respect to liability

* organize your medical records and bills

* communicate with your health care providers to obtain missing records

* work with your doctors to make sure they provide the medical information you need so that you can prove damages in your claim

* organize and present the evidence in order to prove liability and damages

* negotiate with lien holders on your claim (such as health, disability, or workers’ compensation insurers) to potentially reduce the amount of those liens, and

* negotiate a satisfactory settlement with the insurance adjuster or defense attorney.

COMMUNICATING WITH THE OTHER DRIVE'S INSURANCE COMPANY. In any personal injury case, we will open up a line of communication with the insurance adjuster for the other party. The adjuster has the pocketbook, and so it is critical for us to have good communications and a good relationship with the adjuster.

OBTAINING NECESSARY EVIDENCE OF LIABILITY. We can help obtain all of the evidence you will need to prove liability in an injury claim. Although you may have already taken pictures of the scene, we will probably go back to the scene ourselves to see what it looks like. While a picture may be worth a thousand words, actually seeing the scene with our own eyes can be worth a thousand pictures.

We will make sure to get all of the police reports in the case and will often speak with the investigating officers and witnesses. We will leave no stone unturned when it comes to obtaining evidence of liability.

OBTAINING NECESSARY EVIDENCE OF DAMAGES. This is where a good lawyer can be essential to your case, especially when you've suffered significant injuries in connection with a collision. It is critical to obtain all documentation related to your injuries, but it isn't always easy to get your hands on those records and bills from health care providers. Although the records are technically yours, and you have an absolute right to them, sending medical records to patients and lawyers is just not a health care provider’s first priority.

Small doctors’ offices may not have the staff or the time to respond to record requests on a timely basis. Large hospitals may have specific procedures that must be followed in order to respond to record requests. If you don’t follow their procedures (which they often don’t publicize very well), they simply won’t respond to your request. Then, when the health care provider does respond to the request, the records may be incomplete. We often have to request the same records more than once and then we have to follow up endlessly with the provider’s office.

Finally, it may turn out that the doctor did not use the “magic words” as to causation, prognosis, and disability in their notes. In order to successfully prosecute any type of personal injury claim, you must be able to prove, through medical evidence, exactly what your injury, disability, or physical limitation is, and that it was caused by the defendant’s negligence.

Doctors often don’t mention causation and extent of the injury or disability in their medical records. If this happens in your case, we will write the doctor and ask for a narrative report in which the doctor gives their opinion that the collision caused your injury or disability and that, as a result of the collision, you will be hindered or disabled for a specific period of time.

NEGOTIATING WITH LIEN HOLDERS. If you received benefits from a health, disability, or workers’ comp insurer, that insurer will have a lien on your claim. A lien means that the lien holder gets paid before you do, out of any settlement or judgment you receive. We will work with the lien holder to try to get them to reduce their lien. This is important work. Every dollar less that the lien holder takes is one more dollar that goes into your pocket.

NEGOTIATING THE SETTLEMENT. Finally, we will negotiate your settlement. This is hard work. Negotiation is a very specific skill. A personal injury lawyer is always going to be better at settling an injury case than a layperson would be. We know how to value a claim and how to work the case and conduct the negotiations so as to get top dollar from the insurer.

WHEN CAN I HANDLE A COLLISION CASE MYSELF? Most people don’t need lawyers for very small cases. If they are comfortable gathering the evidence and documents themselves and negotiating the settlement, then it is probably in their best interests to do that. Then, they save the 1/3 contingent fee that most personal injury lawyers take. The question is, what is a small case? And where is the line between a small case that you can handle yourself and a larger case for which you absolutely should hire a lawyer? As a general rule, if your medical bills total more than a few thousand dollars, or if you were out of work for more than a few days, you should probably hire a lawyer.

If you or a friend, family member, neighbor, or co-worker has been injured in a collision that was caused by someone else, give us a call at 253.858.5434 to set up an appointment for a free initial consultant today.