PTSD and Personal Injury Claims

Post Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD) will often be a claimed injury in a personal injury case based on an accident that involved kind of shocking or deep disturbing element that adversely affected an individual. The shocking element can involve situations where a family member is forced to become involved in and witness the bloody death of a loved one in a car accident or other accident or from a violent assault of some kind. Those are a few examples but there are many, many situations in today's world where a family member might be deeply scarred by witnessing a child or spouse die in an extremely violent, sudden and terrifying manner and as a result many family members will often find they are suffering from a PTSD injury.

Symptoms of PSTD

PTSD is a severe psychiatric injury that is often overlooked because there is no physical manifestation of a problem. The injury exists and can be life altering. Many soldiers returning home and rape or assault victims appear to be unharmed but the injury is present, serious and life altering in nature. Some of the basic symptoms of PSTD are below:

Reliving the traumatic event in dreams, nightmares or in waking flashbacks
Having no memory of the traumatic event at all
Becoming upset if asked about the event or reminded of the event
Avoiding everything that might remind the person of the traumatic event
Feelings of numb or dead emotions concerning the traumatic event
Feeling of quilt concerning the event
Depression and inability to enjoy life anymore

Treating PTSD

Treating PTSD is no easy fix. The psychiatric trauma often goes very, very deep, an injury that is almost on a soul level, and there is little science to alleviate that type of severe mental pain and anguish. Most physicians can only treat the symptoms of PTSD and hope that time will heal what they essentially cannot. PTSD patients are offered anti anxiety and anti depression medications and should be monitored for developing drug and alcohol dependencies associated with self medication reactions.

Getting Legal Help

If you or a member of your family has been involved in an accident or an assault or witnessed an accident or assault of a family member it may be important to discuss the situation with a personal injury lawyer. If you have suffered a PTSD injury you may have rights to recover financially from the perpetrator of a crime or reckless vehicle operator to allow you to access medical help to begin to treat the PTSD condition.

Have a Personal Injury Case?