Combat stress is the number one cause of Post Traumatic Stress Disorder. Extreme stress, like being in a battle, destroys part of the cerebral cortex. That erosion creates a chemical imbalance in the brain which causes the symptoms listed below.
That finding, which has changed the way doctors approach PTSD, is just part of the new research into this type of brain injury. In the early 2000s, researchers discovered a link between financial stress and PTSD.
So, returning war veterans are not the only people who must deal with PTSD. Ordinary Minnesotans may experience this brain injury as well. If a lack of care caused this injury, as it often does, a Buffalo injury lawyer can obtain the compensation victims need to put their lives back together.
What Causes Injury-Related PTSD?
Typically, all unintentional injuries may cause Acute Financial Stress (AFS), which is the medical term for PTSD that’s related to money problems. Car crashes and other such injuries usually cause massive financial stress. When medical providers demand payment, the victim is usually still not able to work, so there is no money to pay these bills.
However, AFS is usually not a foreseeable result of a car crash. This type of PTSD is like a victim going to a hospital and a doctor making a medical mistake. Technically, the wreck and malpractice are related, but the connection is too indirect.
Car crash-induced PTSD, on the other hand, is a different matter. After a serious wreck, many victims endure nightmares and flashbacks. Heightened awareness and avoidance are both common as well. A speeding car is a threat instead of an annoyance, and many car crash survivors avoid the intersection or part of town where the accident occurred.
Dog bites often cause PTSD, perhaps because they are closely related to combat wounds. These injuries are especially common among child victims. Other types of unintentional injuries, such as falls, might cause PTSD as well.
PTSD Symptoms
Everyone suffers from emotional distress after an accident. Generally, this distress has physical symptoms, like tremors or nausea. Such distress is a standard component of the noneconomic damages that a Buffalo injury lawyer commonly obtains in these cases.
Prolonged or intense emotional distress, however, is not normal. So, if your emotional symptoms persist for more than a few days, or if the symptoms intensify, you may have an undiagnosed brain injury that is causing PTSD symptoms. Talk to your doctor or Buffalo injury lawyer straightaway. If the brain injury is not treated, the symptoms will get worse.
These symptoms are remarkably consistent in different victims. Roughly five hundred years ago, William Shakespeare aptly described some PTSD symptoms in this passage from Henry IV, Part 1:
O my good lord, why are you thus alone? For what offense have I this fortnight been a banished woman from my Harry’s bed? Tell me, sweet lord, what is ‘t that takes from thee thy stomach, pleasure, and thy golden sleep? Why dost thou bend thine eyes upon the earth, and start so often when thou sit’st alone? Why hast thou lost the fresh blood in thy cheeks and given my treasures and my rights of thee to thick-eyed musing and curst melancholy? In thy faint slumbers, I by thee have watched, and heard thee murmur tales of iron wars.
To many PTSD victims and Buffalo injury lawyers, this passage is one of the most chilling ones in all of the Bard’s works. In speaking to her husband Hotspur, who has recently returned from a war, Lady Percy mentions isolation (why are you thus alone), unreasonable anger toward family members (a banished woman from my Harry’s bed), lack of interest in formerly pleasurable activities, sleeplessness, depression, and other common PTSD symptoms.
PTSD Treatment
Brain injuries are permanent, because dead cerebral cortex cells, and other brain cells, never regenerate. One day soon, stem cell therapy and other emerging treatments may change that outcome, but that day may still be decades away.
PTSD has no cure, but there are treatments available. In some cases, especially if there is any brain bleeding, doctors may perform surgery to relieve the pressure on the brain. But in most cases, PTSD treatment involves physical therapy.
This therapy is different. If a victim breaks an arm, a physical therapist must strengthen the arm muscles once the bone heals. But when victims break their brains, therapists must teach uninjured portions of the brain to assume the lost functions. Such an approach requires a highly-specialized therapist. Additionally, both the therapist and victim must be very patient, because progress usually comes in fits and starts.
Buffalo injury lawyers can connect victims with the therapists they need, and also obtain the compensation they need to get that therapy.
Connect with an Experienced Attorney
Injury accidents often cause PTSD. For a free consultation with an experienced Buffalo injury lawyer, contact Carlson & Jones, P.A. We do not charge upfront legal fees in negligence cases.