Can I Pursue a Car Accident Case If I Have Prior Health Problems?

It is common for a person with prior back pain to get hit in a car accident and wind up with far worse back pain than before. Because of the prior back pain the insurance adjustor might say their case isn’t worth anything, and that the insurance company isn’t going to pay a dime for personal injury-related costs for a person who already had back pain before the car accident.

Sometimes it can be hard to determine what injury or damage was caused by the accident when a person already had some pain beforehand, but a case is not automatically worth less just because of prior health problems. The law doesn’t allow a driver who is at fault, to avoid liability for another person’s injuries just because that other person already had prior health problems and injuries. The driver-at-fault is liable for aggravating or making prior health problems worse.

It’s important to be honest and up-front about your prior health problems when talking to your attorney in helping to initially evaluate your case. If you have had prior back problems you absolutely must let your attorney know, and be sure to be accurate with your doctors about prior problems so the doctors know your accurate health status before the crash.

In pre-existing injury cases though, you definitely need an experienced attorney who is prepared to take your case to trial. The likelihood that this type of injury case will go to trial is greater than cases where the injury is clear.