How Do You Prove Your Injuries from a SEPTA Accident?

If you were injured due to SEPTA’s negligence – whether it be in a bus accident, trolley accident, regional rail accident, or a trip and fall due to a property defect – beyond proving SEPTA was at fault you will also have to prove your injuries to have a claim against it.  Specifically, that the injuries you have were due to SEPTA’s negligence.

Valerio Pucci, CC BY-SA 4.0, via Wikimedia Commons

How To Prove Injuries

An important way to prove your physical injuries is through your medical records and medical treatment. If whatever injury you had was not significant enough to need medical treatment, then it is unlikely you will get a recovery against SEPTA in your claim. Or if you can get a recovery, it will be very minor. Even if you receive medical treatment for your injuries, if you delay getting treatment for them for a long amount of time, it will make it more difficult to prove the treatment you received was related to your SEPTA accident. Of course, there regularly are situations where you can have adrenaline built up after an accident, and you may not immediately realize or feel how badly you were injured. Whether the delay in treatment of any injuries you have from your SEPTA accident will prevent you in bringing a claim all depends on the facts of your case.

 

Will You Need Witness Testimony?

You may also need medical expert testimony and reports to prove your injuries and treatment were related to your SEPTA accident. This is especially so if you had complex treatment for your injuries that is not easily understood by a regular person. If you had any issues in the past, medical expert testimony will be helpful in explaining that your injuries and treatment are from your accident, and not just from an ongoing preexisting condition. A lot of times this expert medical testimony will come from your treating doctors.

You can also prove what your injuries are by testimony from your friends, family, or co-workers. A co-worker can testify about what kind of worker you were before your accident, and how you are not able to do certain things with your job after the accident if your injuries limit your ability to work. Your family or friends can testify about how you are different or more limited since your injuries from the accident.

Yesums, CC BY-SA 4.0, via Wikimedia Commons

 

Proving Your Losses From SEPTA Accidents

Physical injuries are not the only damage you will need to prove. If you are claiming financial losses you will need to prove those as well. If you missed time from work in the past you will need to produce paystubs and tax returns showing what your wages were during the period you were out of work.  If you can no longer do your job due to your injuries, you will need similar evidence to prove what your future lost wages are. You will likely need expert medical testimony about how the injuries you suffered from your SEPTA accident are preventing you from working. You may also need a vocational expert to testify about what type of work and jobs you are limited to due to your injuries.

Beyond lost wages you may have medical expenses that you paid for out of pocket which can be shown by the billing records of your medical care providers. Depending on the type of accident and type of health insurance you have, your health insurance may have a right to get paid back what bills it covered for your medical treatment out of any settlement or verdict in your case. Medicare and Medicaid have this right. If you have future expected medical expenses, you may need an expert to discuss what those expenses are.

Experienced SEPTA accident attorneys, such as the team at the Thistle Law Firm, will know how to prove your injuries and damages in a SEPTA accident case. If you or a loved one were injured due to SEPTA’s negligence, an attorney at The Thistle Law Firm is here to take your call at 215-568-6800 or fill out our contact form here.

 

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