Getting into a collision with another vehicle can cause a lot of damage to your car and your body. After a car accident, you might walk away thinking you haven’t been injured and you only suffered from property damage to your vehicle. Or you might think there hasn’t been any damage done at all and you leave the scene. But then hours or days later, you start feeling symptoms that show you were injured in the wreck.
You might ignore these symptoms because you don’t associate them with the collision since they didn’t show up right away. But just because you didn’t feel hurt at first doesn’t mean that your injuries weren’t directly caused by the car wreck.
It’s possible your body released adrenaline at the time, which could mask any pain you would have felt immediately after, which is why injuries could present later. That’s why it’s important to know symptoms that could show later that indicate you were injured in the car crash.
Symptoms to Look for After an Auto Wreck
As mentioned above, your adrenaline could mask any immediate symptoms of injuries from your collision, which is why you should know the delayed symptoms of injuries so that you can recognize when you’ve been hurt and need to seek out medical attention. Even if you don’t experience any pain, it’s still helpful to immediately get evaluated by a medical professional. That way, they can identify injuries you don’t even realize are there.
If you don’t get treated right away, then you might not feel symptoms until later. Here are some of those symptoms to look for after a car accident that might indicate you were injured and didn’t immediately realize:
- Cuts and Bruises. Superficial injuries like cuts and bruises might appear hours or days after your collision when you didn’t know that they were there at all. Even though these can be mild and not require any serious attention, it’s good to get them evaluated by a doctor so that you have a record of the injury for the future. They can also evaluate you and ensure that the cuts and bruises aren’t from any deeper or more serious injuries.
- Headaches. If you start having a headache, that could mean that your head or surrounding body parts could be hurt. Headaches could be a sign of a concussion, whiplash, or another soft tissue injury in your neck. While these injuries usually heal on their own, it’s important to get medical help immediately if you start getting headaches because these injuries could worsen and become severe when left untreated.
- Body Soreness and Pain. You might feel general aches and pains in your body after a car accident. You could assume that these pains are just superficial injuries and nothing serious, but there’s no way to know for sure unless you get evaluated by a doctor. While soreness and pain could be mild, it could also point to more serious injuries like burns, broken bones, sprains, strains, and whiplash.
- Stomach Pain. One of the symptoms you could experience that points to a more serious injury is stomach pain. Pain in other parts of the body usually points to musculoskeletal injuries, but when the pain is localized to your stomach or abdominal area, it could point to internal organ damage and internal bleeding. This is serious and needs immediate medical care.
- Confusion. Another symptom that could mean you were harmed in a car crash is if you experience any kind of confusion. Injuries like whiplash and concussions could present themselves in the form of confusion, which could greatly affect your mental health. If the accident gave you emotional injuries as well then confusion could also point to that.
The most important thing to do after you start realizing you’re experiencing symptoms of potential injuries, you should seek out medical attention. The sooner you see a doctor or another medical professional, the sooner you can get evaluated, treated, and start healing. You never know how serious your injuries are until you’re treated, which is why you need to go as soon as you start hurting.
DiPiero Simmons McGinley & Bastress, PLLC Will Support You
When you’ve been in a collision that caused you injuries and other damages, you deserve to get justice if another party was at fault for what happened. You shouldn’t be responsible for your bills and other costs that you suffered from because you wouldn’t have them if the other party hadn’t been negligent.
When you decide to hire a Charleston car accident lawyer, you can rest assured that we will look carefully into your claim and make it as strong as possible for you. At DiPiero Simmons McGinley & Bastress, PLLC, we’re prepared to fight for you until you get full and fair compensation. Reach out to us today so we can get started on your claim.
