While bicycling is an inexpensive form of transportation and great for your health, bike accidents can result in serious and permanent injuries. As per the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, more than 500,000 bicyclists are treated for injuries every year in the United States. About 700 of those die from injuries that are often caused by careless motorists or unsafe roads.
Traffic and road conditions can be unpredictable. Even experienced cyclists can suffer serious and tragic injuries in the event of a crash. They face any number of hazards like motorists who:
- Fail to yield the right-of-way
- Pass without keeping a safe distance away
- Make left or right turns in front of them
- Back up into bicyclists
- Open vehicle doors in front of them
Unsafe road conditions like potholes, sinkholes, cracked pavement and construction debris or materials left on the roadway can also cause a cyclist to lose control of a bicycle.
Insurance company hostility
The same as with motorcyclists, insurance companies are often hostile with bicyclists too. Given an opportunity, they’ll try to shift all or some of the blame for a crash over onto the bicyclist. That’s just one of several reasons why it’s important for a cyclist who was injured in a crash to contact our Coeur d’Alene law office.
Damages
Other than perhaps a helmet, bicyclists are vulnerable and exposed to serious injuries like multiple fractures, dislocations, infections from friction burns and traumatic brain and spinal cord injuries. Serious injuries can result in damages like:
- Past and future medical bills
- Past and future lost earnings
- Permanent disfigurement
- Permanent disability
- Pain and suffering
- Loss of a normal life
Our goal is to maximize any compensation paid to you for those damages. We’ll look to all available insurance coverage, including your own car insurance if your case involves an uninsured or underinsured driver.
Medical authorizations and statements
The insurer of the party who caused your accident will want a medical authorization from you. Idaho law doesn’t require you to provide that authorization, and we don’t recommend that you provide it. That insurer might ask you to give a recorded statement too. Again, Idaho law doesn’t require you to give a statement, and it’s our recommendation that you politely refuse to give one. The opposing insurer will only try to use your prior medical records along with the words from your own statement against you in the future. Talk with us instead.
Contact a Coeur d’Alene Bicycle Accident Lawyer
If you or a family member have suffered a serious injury in a bicycle accident in Coeur d’Alene or anywhere else in Idaho, contact us by phone or email to arrange for a free consultation and case evaluation.
