Accident Settlements and Claims for Herniated Disc Injury Cases.

A favorite tactic of lawyers defending personal injury cases on behalf of the insurance companies involving herniated discs is pointing the finger at preexisting degenerative problems with a patient’s spine such as spinal stenosis, osteoarthritis, and spondylolisthesis. Most of these are conditions that begin in many people in their early 30s. Therefore, it must be established that the patient’s problems are not due to the degenerative condition, but to the trauma sustained in the accident.   Only an attorney specializing in the field of personal accident or injury has the background to properly evaluate this type of accident or injury and defend against such arguments.  If you feel you have been injured in an accident, please contact us now for a free case evaluation.

Hi, I’m Tim Williams with Dwyer Williams Potter Attorneys. I’m the lead litigation attorney here at the firm and also a partner. I’m going to talk about disk herniations. What we see here is a close-up of the spine. We see a bony vertebra here, a bony vertebra here and in between the two is a disk.

Sometimes a disk can become damaged.  A disk is a softer material.  It’s not hard like the bones. More fibrous and harder on the outside, but very jelly-like on the inside, and every so often something can happen to the back; for instance, a trauma that can cause a rip in this outer layer and allow the inner gooey layer or jelly-like layer to leak through.

In the first image of the diagram we see a healthy disk, the pink and white area, and then we also see the yellow, which is the spinal cord.  And you can see that the pink area, which is the outer layer or the fibrous layer I described, is solid and there’s nothing leaking through, no rips, no tears, anything of that nature.

Now, looking at the second diagram, we see there’s actually a tear in this outer pink layer. You can see the jelly-like substance is poking through and putting pressure on the root, the nerve root.  That area there where it’s putting pressure is called the nerve root because it’s the root of the nerve that exits from the spinal cord.  The cord is the big yellow thing you see there in the middle.

And then sometimes while they can occur on the side, like we see in that second diagram, they can occur right in the middle and actually put pressure on the spinal cord itself.  And looking at the third diagram that’s what is happening.  So you can see the rip in the outer layer, the pink layer. The light jelly is protruding out through the rip and it’s putting pressure on the spinal cord.  Now, whether you have pressure on your spinal cord or whether you have pressure on the nerve root, they can both cause some pretty significant pain and interference.

So, again, here is the two levels of the spine and here is the disk.  In this model we actually have, first, a central herniation; central meaning it’s in the middle.  And so you’ll see there is a herniation right here, where it represents the inner jelly substance poking out and pressing against the spinal cord.  And that, again, can cause interferences with any of the nerves that are trying to communicate with the brain through this area of the spinal cord.  So the higher up in your back it is the more nerves it can affect.

And so you take this out and look at it, again, this is the disk.  It’s sort of a rubbery substance and inside is the jelly material poking out, and that’s what is causing the problem. The second disk here is the same deal, but we see that the jelly substance is poking out the side.  And this is more unique because it causes problems when you put it into place, as you can see, with pressure is against this nerve right here.  And so rather than affecting the whole bundle of nerves, it goes down and passes by this particular disk, it’s only affecting this branch of nerves it comes off, and this is the nerve root, and that can cause pressure, it can cause interference and pain or even numbness and tingling down this nerve root.  So, for instance, if this nerve is innervating or supplying nerves to the arm, you can have pain and pressure, you can have numbness, complete absence of a feeling or even tingling down your arm.  And that’s what your brain interprets, is there’s a problem with your arm, even though the problem really lies here in your back.

Basically, there are three treatment options for disk herniations.  First, you can leave it alone and see if the disk reabsorbs and fixes itself.  If that doesn’t work, you can go through physical therapy, medications and even injections to see if that will fix the disk and the problem.  And, if that doesn’t work, the last option is surgery.

I want to thank you for looking at this video.  Please feel free to check out other videos on our website.

Hopefully, you found this information useful and helpful. I want to thank you for watching this video, and I encourage you to

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Herniations occur when the tough, fibrous outer ring of an intervertebral disk tears, allowing the soft interior to bulge out. The interior of a disk is highly inflammatory to surrounding nerves and tissue, which can cause severe pain. Also, the herniation can be so severe that it physically pushes on the nerves exiting the spinal canal, causing the entire nerve to become aggravated, or presses on the spinal cord itself (spinal stenosis). This results in pain, numbness, and tingling in the nerve, including down the arms or legs, which is referred to as radiculopathy. This is commonly referred to as sciatica when involving the legs. Radiculopathy is often seen where persons over the age of 40 are injured, as the disks are more fragile with age. However, in high-impact injuries, such as car or truck crashes, younger persons can suffer a disk herniation. They sometimes resolve on their own, but often require surgery.

The value of a herniated disk claim depends on numerous factors, including the type of surgery performed, the number of disks involved, the prior condition of the disks, the ultimate outcome of treatment or surgery, and any permanent restrictions. Insurance companies often hire doctors to say that the injured person would have had the surgery at some point in their life anyway. Only an attorney specializing in the field of personal accident or injury has the background to properly evaluate this type of accident or injury and defend against such arguments.