Shoulder Pain After a Car Accident: Injuries it May Indicate

The speed and blunt force of automobile accidents can put tremendous trauma on different parts of the body including the shoulder.

Those blows can manifest themselves in different ways and different personal injuries. To address these serious injuries, you may need surgery, prescription medication, physical therapy, and other rehabilitative care.

This will not be easy. Shoulder damage from motor vehicle accidents can change your life. They often tax personal injury victims in the form of medical bills, missed work, handicaps, lost hobbies, pain, and other direct and indirect costs. We can help though!

Schedule a free consultation with one of our car accident attorneys to discuss what options and settlement amounts may be available to you. Our team is dedicated and committed to your recovery in Illinois.

Review the following information to understand this issue more thoroughly and use our contact form to get in touch with us for any questions.

If you suffered shoulder pain or shoulder injury (like a rotator cuff tear or torn rotator cuff) or any pain after a car accident, then you should call us because we have brought cases in suite for basically any kind of injury after a auto accident like joint damage, injured arm bone, soft tissues damage, rotator cuff tears, loss of range of motion, shoulder joint inflammation, pain, ball and socket pain, neck fracture or fractures, arm bone injury tears and other types of shoulder injuries.

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Shoulder pain after a car accident may be indicative of several types of injuries.

Shoulder Injuries Sustained in Car Crashes

The shoulder connects different parts of the human body together. Therefore, it can get pulled into trouble and harm in many different ways including sprains, fractures, punctures, and strains.

Here are some of the most common kinds of shoulder injuries in car accidents across Chicago.

Rotator Cuff Tear. At high speeds, the muscles around the shoulder can tear and cause a rotator cuff injury. This is commonly suffered by car accident victims.

Soft Tissue Trauma. Ligaments, muscles, and tendons around your shoulder might suffer blunt trauma (with the steering wheel, dashboard, etc.) or piercing pain if they are impacted. These are some of the most serious and expensive shoulder injuries.

Dislocation. This happens in car accidents when arms ejects from the shoulder blade socket. It is quite common too because the shoulder is the body’s less-fixed and most moveable joint especially if the steering wheel is close by.

Whiplash. Motorists can experience whiplash slap in their shoulder after a sudden start and stop motion. You might feel this as pain shoots through your shoulder or it stiffens and locks up.

Get a free consultation today on all types of auto accident shoulder injuries and common shoulder injuries and treatment involving the shoulder joint, upper arm bone, muscles, shoulder blade, and other types of shoulder injuries.

If you are experiencing shoulder pain or symptoms of a shoulder pain or injury, then call us over the phone or come to our suite to see how a legal claim could help you fix your body after a fracture, fractures, and subsequent therapy.

Treating a Shoulder Injury from Car Accident

In order to determine the correct path of treatment for shoulder injuries, you will need to undergo extensive testing (x-ray, MRI, ultrasound, etc.) and consultation with your doctor or doctors and specialists.

They will give you a comprehensive set of options to treat the immediate and recurring pain that you may experience as a result of the shoulder damage and related loss of physical range of motion, fracture, severe neck tears, injured arm, and other shoulder pain after the car accident.

Among the many routes of healthcare offered to patients with shoulder aggravation are the following:

  • Diagnosis
  • Surgery
  • Rehabilitation
  • Physical Therapy
  • Medication
  • Injections

You may need one or many of these suggested treatments or even something not listed here. The important thing is to talk to a specialized doctor and to record all of your medical care in proper legal records.

This will help you a lot later on when you bring a personal injury lawsuit or other car accident legal claim for financial compensation.

If you have car accident shoulder pain after a car wreck, then call us or come to our suite to talk about your shoulder injury, shoulder pain, car accident shoulder damage, arm or main bones symptoms, difficulty moving, or even if you are just experiencing shoulder pain or other pain after a car collision.

Shoulder Injury and Car Accident Facts

  • The average settlement payout for shoulder personal injury claims is near $100,000.
  • Most automobile accident victims with shoulder damage experience pain for between one to two months.
  • Shoulder surgery (arthroplasty; hemiarthroplasty; etc.) can cost tens of thousands of dollars and many people need more than one following a Chicago car crash.
  • Rehabilitation for shoulder surgery can take several months and could require many weeks or more away from work costing thousands of dollars.
  • Most common shoulder injuries from Illinois motor vehicle accidents are torn rotator cuffs, fractured clavicle, broken humerus, soft tissue damage, shoulder strain, and whiplash.

Call us over the phone if you have severe symptoms of an injured shoulder or neck and want to know your medical, legal, and other options after an auto crash.

We can help you get proper treatment and possibly compensation if you have suffered a shoulder injury in an auto incident that limited your daily activities, limited your range of motion, or caused you pain.

Items Affecting Settlement in Car Crashes Cases with Shoulder Injuries

Shoulder injury damage from an automobile accident or any other accident for that matter can have drastic consequences on your health right after it happens and for a long time after that.

These injuries can manifest in large medical bills, absences from work, and other losses. If you are considering a personal injury case to recoup some of these costs, there are some factors you should consider that bode well for a possible settlement amount.

First, disability or long-term impairment. One of the biggest things that affects settlement value and your ability to settle is if the shoulder harm will impair your life for a long time in the future. Disability does that exactly so you should highlight that fact to increase your odds at a favorable settlement amount.

Second, missed income or investments. If you could not work while recovering from the shoulder injuries suffered in the car crash, or if you missed out on expected investments during that time, this could drastically increase your settlement value. It may especially go up if it appears to prospectively decrease your earning potential as well.

Third, and finally, quality of life declines. If the car accident and subsequent shoulder injuries changed your life for the worse-suffering, lost self-esteem, lost relationships-you should articulate this in your personal injury claim.

It can fundamentally affect what you receive and your chance to resolve the matter swiftly.

If you work with our car accident attorneys, we can illustrate how the factors of your specific crash impact settlement and what you can do to preserve your financial compensation options. This will help you get treatment for whatever did cause shoulder pain after a car incident.

Jury Awards and Settlement Amounts for Car Accident Shoulder Injuries

$850,000 Shoulder Injury Settlement; 2018:

A man in his early forties was sideswiped by a large truck tractor-trailer on Interstate eighty. He was attempting to exit off of the highway when the big rig slammed into him.

The plaintiff claimed the crash left him with a rotator cuff tear, worsened spinal condition, and other personal injuries. He forked over nearly $400,000 for medical treatment to cure these ills including fusion surgery and other procedures.

The defendant large truck driver denied these claims and suggested the plaintiff’s injuries pre-dated this crash. Yet, the two sides soon started haggling to find an amount of financial compensation that would end this lawsuit. In the end, the man obtained $850,000 for his harms and losses!

$800,000 Settlement; 2017:

A truck driver rear-ended the plaintiff, a man in his late fifties, as he sat waiting in his automobile in a traffic jam on an Illinois highway. Due to the event, the plaintiff experienced shoulder tendonitis, rotator cuff strain, joint damage, and PTSD.

Counting all of the medical bills, he spent one quarter of a million dollars because of the car crash and lost almost $200,000 from missing work in recovery.

To make up for this and the pain, trauma, treatment, and suffering of the affair, he sued the truck driver and large truck company. The parties decided to get around trial by privately negotiating and they eventually settled for $800,000.

$250,000 Settlement; 2001:

This car accident case was between a driver and a passenger. The latter, an eighty-year-old woman, was being driven around by a friend in the Chicagoland area. At some point, the driver turned left but collided into another vehicle.

The elderly woman sustained a broken clavicle injury, fractured ribs, shoulder pain, and other serious injuries because of the crash slap according to the doctor. Bills for her medical treatment almost hit $100,000. She sued the car accident driver for these costs as well as the pain and suffering they caused her pain after a car accident..

The woman lived a rather quiet and sedentary lifestyle but still had a claim for reduced quality of life (lost range of motion, poor diagnosis, increased medical treatment, significant injury and pain, etc.) . The driver’s insurance carrier took over this car accident case and eventually settled with the woman for $250,000.

$495,000 Settlement; Cook County, Illinois; 1997:

A young woman in her late teens was injured when her friend crashed into a pole in the Cook County suburbs of Chicago. She sustained a concussion, broken clavicle, and other personal injuries per her doctor. They necessitated multiple surgeries (medical bills were more than $75,000).

The young girl also experienced ongoing shoulder pain and disability due to the circumstances of the motor vehicle accident injury. She sued the driver for reckless driving and negligence. The pair agreed to settle the matter for $495,000.

Talk to our Chicago Car Accident Lawyers about your MVA Shoulder Injury Case

Rosenfeld Injury Lawyers has worked with thousands of car accidents suffering from serious injuries like shoulder damage. We understand the hard work and resources that makes the difference with personal injury claims. That will surely count when you are pursuing financial compensation in Illinois.

Talk to one of the car accident attorneys in a free consultation over the phone today if you have pain after a car accident. We can lay out a plan that leaves nothing to chance for your car accident shoulder pain case. You deserve the best. We can begin today with a free case evaluation!

Further Reading and Sources for General Information Purposes