The Twin Cities and surrounding suburbs are some of the most cyclist-friendly metropolitan areas in the nation. This means more people do their morning commute on a bicycle or get in some afternoon exercise on a bike, but it also means we generally have more cyclist injuries than a lot of areas. So what should you do if you have been injured by a vehicle while riding your bicycle? We explain your rights and your compensation options below.
Getting Compensation For Cyclist Injuries
If you want to help ensure your injury compensation claim goes smoothly, do these things after a bicycle accident.
1. Report this incident – If you’ve suffered an accident with injuries, stay at the scene and call the police. This way there is an official accident report to fall back on. Even if injuries are minor, adrenaline can mask pain and it can set in later, so always consider calling the police and documenting the incident. If anyone saw the accident and can verify your claims, get their contact information unless you need to seek immediate medical attention.
2. Get a medical evaluation – Next, you’ll want to get an official medical diagnosis and documentation from a licensed physician. You can go to your primary care physician, but you may also want to get an evaluation from a doctor who specializes in your type of injury. Your lawyer or your physician should be able to refer you to a doctor who can give you the best medical evaluation following your type of accident.
3. Get Legal Help – You can do this step before step two if you need help finding a doctor who can provide you with a medical evaluation, but you definitely want to talk to a lawyer at some point early in the process. They will be able to look at your injuries, talk to witnesses, form an argument and put everything in your official medical claim. They can also help to factor in other aspects of your case that are compensable, like pain and suffering, medical bills, mileage for driving to appointments and other factors that you may gloss over if you try to file on your own. More often than not, a lawyer pays for their services many times over by getting you a much larger award than you would have been able to achieve on your own.
4. Keep Detailed Records – Document everything related to your injury case, including details about the accident, witness information, conversations you had and correspondences you received. If it pertains to your injury case, keep a log of it. This will help you keep your story straight and provide accurate information. Telling different versions of a story or being incorrect about dates and conversations can hurt the validity of your claim, so keep detailed records.
5. Keep The Bike – The bike itself, or at least pictures of the damage it received can also be helpful in proving your case. They can speak to the severity of your condition and help prove your side of the story. Even if the bike is no longer functioning, keep it for the duration of your injury case.
If you follow these five tips and trust your injury case to an experienced law firm like Hey Workers, we’re confident that you’ll have a good chance of maximizing your claim amount. If you want help with your injury claim, or you want to talk to a lawyer to see if you have a case, please don’t hesitate to reach out to the experienced lawyers at Hey Workers.
