A spinal cord injury suffered in a severe car accident certainly can have short-term ramifications. You may immediately be transported to the hospital and you may be out of work indefinitely. So you have to consider medical bills, lost wages and many other costs if you’re seeking compensation from the driver who caused the catastrophic wreck.
But if you have a serious spinal cord injury, then you also need to look at the long-term financial ramifications. You need to get proper compensation for all of your financial losses that stem from that accident. The cost of a spinal cord injury can last for years or even decades.
What if your spinal cord injury leads to paraplegia?
When someone becomes paraplegic, it means that they cannot use their arms or legs, and their motor skills are lost or severely limited. This can be a disability because it keeps you out of work, perhaps forever, and you may also need medication and long-term care and assistance.
As a result, paraplegia can lead to roughly $518,000 worth of costs in the first year after the injury. For each subsequent year after that injury, it can lead to another $68,000 in costs.
But this isn’t even the most expensive injury. Consider a high tetraplegia, for instance, between the C1 and the C4 vertebrae. It could lead to $1 million of initial costs in the first year and around $184,000 annually after that.
Plus, these are just projections from the Christopher & Dana Reeve Foundation. Every injury has its own unique factors, so the costs could be even higher. If you have suffered this type of major injury due to someone else’s negligence, make sure you are well aware of your legal options to seek compensation.