In some personal injury claims, the injured party may also have a pre-existing injury or condition. In these cases, the defense is likely to do everything it can to point out the existence of the condition, especially if it’s somehow related to the injury claim.
To prevent pre-existing conditions from having any ill effects on your claim, make sure that you disclose any prior injuries that you have right at the outset of your case. If you don’t tell your attorney about these conditions, especially ones that affect the part of your body that was injured in this particular case, it could severely damage your credibility throughout the claim and limit the amount of money you could recover in compensation. It could also make juries call into question the legitimacy of your current injuries, if you are proven to have lied about previous ones.
You can still recover compensation if you had a pre-existing condition so long as you are able to prove that the accident you were in worsened the condition. Therefore, you must have documentation of the state of your injury before the accident occurred. Comparisons of medical records, diagnostic tests, prescriptions, treatments, x-rays, MRIs and more from before and after the injury can provide a clear picture of how your incident worsened your condition, and the extent to which it was worsened.
So while pre-existing injuries don’t necessarily doom your personal injury case, a failure to report them could. Be open and honest from the very beginning about your injuries and you will not have anything to worry about.
For more information on pre-existing injuries and how they might impact a personal injury claim, speak with a knowledgeable Bradenton attorney at Goldman, Babboni, Fernandez, Murphy & Walsh.