An average bulging disc injury is valued at $150,000 in Los Angeles County, CA. And it can be worth more or less, depending on your city, state, and overall injury severity. Also, if you are wealthy and miss work, the case can be worth far more. If it ends up in total paralysis, or wrongful death, it could wind up being worth millions of dollars in damages. Being involved in a car accident isn’t something anyone can plan for, but you need to be ready whenever it does happen. We know that the first several hours after an accident can be crucial. Our injury lawyers handle all accident injury cases, including herniated discs or bulging disc injuries.

The Process to Determine How Much Herniated Discs or Bulging Disc Is Worth?

Doctors can confuse a bulging disc injury for a herniated disc. While they affect the same body area, you should be aware that there are differences between bulging disc injuries and disc herniation. Those differences can affect the value of your herniated disc injury claim. This is why the first step in understanding case value if retaining a proper medical doctor with vast experience diagnosing and treating serious back injuries.

What Is a Bulged Disc?

To understand what a bulging disc is, you first have to understand the anatomy of the spine. Your spine comprises interlocking bones called the vertebrae, probably the bones you know the most about. You can run your hands along your back and feel all the bones in your spine. But people don’t know that there are discs between each vertebra.

A soft disc or spinal disc separates each vertebra from the others. The discs help to keep your spine separated and prevent the bones from clacking together to form injuries. When old age or a car wreck compresses your spine, those discs spread horizontally, and that can cause severe pain in your back.

What is the Difference Between a Bulging Disc and a Herniated Disc?

The spinal discs also have gel in the middle of their outer layers, and when the gel leaks out due to the disc compression, it is a herniated disc.

A bulging disc injury can lead to problems, including issues with your:

• Legs
• Bladder
• Your overall mobility.

Doctors often consider a herniated disc injury much more severe. A herniated disc isn’t as standard as a bulged disc, but it is much more powerful, given its effect on your body.

Insurance agencies try to brush off a bulging disc case as ‘not as bad’ after an accident compared to a disc herniation. They try to get you to quickly agree to a settlement so they can sweep the case under the rug. However, an improperly treated bulging disc injury can cause more damage to the nerves in your spine than a herniated disc can.

While gel leakage into your body can cause problems, the most common effects of bulging disc injuries are problems with pain and suffering in the arms and legs from the already widening parts of your spine from the bulge. It only becomes a herniated disc when it leaks fluid into your body.

A defense lawyer will argue that a bulging disc is a soft sign of an actual injury, while a herniated disc is something you should be concerned about during your post-car wreck recovery. After all, gravity pushes down on our spines, so our discs bulge slightly anyway over the years.

Additionally, having a bulging disc can happen naturally as we age, so most defense attorneys and insurance companies don’t treat a non-herniated disc too seriously. A bulging disc from accidents is also much more common than a herniated disc case. The impact and jolt from a car accident can cause some problems for your spine. If you already had a hurt spine due to a vehicle accident, the trauma can activate a bulging disc and cause a herniated disc.

Herniated discs are also much easier to justify on your medical bills because they are uncommon. If you have a herniated disc due to an auto accident, our injury lawyer should be able to help you with your medical bills and the portion of the disc that is herniated.

While doctors treat a bulging disc with kid gloves, our injury lawyer team treats any bulging disc or herniated disc case with much more respect. A herniated disc is unnatural because our spinal discs don’t normally slip and release spinal fluid into our bodies as we age, like bulging discs. The discomfort from a herniated disc is much easier to understand, so those cases often go for more settlement money.

How Do Our Spinal Cord Injury Lawyers Argue a Bulged Disc Case?

Bulging disc cases often receive less money than cases for herniated discs, but that doesn’t mean that our lawyers aren’ fight hard to reverse that trend with you. Our attorneys focus on disproving the myths that state that bulging and herniated discs are not severe. The firm’s accident lawyers work with experts and try to explain that bulging disc or disc herniation injuries are causing your pain and suffering.

Whether it is normal or not, our injury lawyer wants to prove that a disc bulge or herniated disc is a debilitating injury and is causing you pain and suffering. We can then verify that the bulged disc injury can compensate you for your medical bills, including physical therapy and lost wages. The main problem is that all sorts of preexisting conditions can cause bulging discs. Our injury attorneys need to prove that the car wreck caused the disc bulge or ruptured disc.

Arguing for a bulging disc or herniated disc is the same as if we were arguing about you breaking your leg. The type of wound doesn’t matter as much; we need to prove that the driver at fault for the accident was negligent and that your injuries received are because of the car accident in order to resolve the settlement of your claim.

We can not guarantee this is the case, but the sudden jolt when you are rear-ended during car accidents causes most bulging disc injuries. Cases that involve a car getting T-boned or sideswiped by another driver are also car accident cases that tend to have higher payouts by an insurance company.

How Are These Spinal Cord Injury Cases Calculated?

Since bulging discs can happen after an accident, how valuable the case is depends end on several factors. Your age, medical history, lost wages, the need for physical therapy, and any previous car accidents all increase and decrease the amount, the value, and the money you can get for your car wreck.

If you are older and have a history of back problems when you get into a car accident, it will be much harder to prove that the crash caused your back issues and that you didn’t always have a bulging disc or herniation. Younger drivers tend to get a higher settlement on their cases once settled, but that isn’t always the case. If you have high credibility as a plaintiff, then herniated or bulging disc cases can favor you.

How Can You Recover From a Bulged Disc?

With most of the money going towards your medical bills, it can give you some good peace of mind when you realize that a bulging disc can eventually heal. The lumbar spine can heal itself over time as the body sends the immune system against the extra material of the disc. With the different parts of the disc destroyed, the inflammation goes down.

The spinal discs are filled with water; over time, all excess water goes back into the body. This eventually decreases the size of the bulging disc and brings it back to its proper size, the size it was before the car crash.

What Are Bulging Disc Medical Treatments for Pain and Suffering?

Medical treatments can include proper exercise, pain medication, physical therapy, and doing certain things to relax the muscles can also aid in repairing bulged discs. Other treatments include injecting the hurt portion of the disc with Cortisone, which helps to reduce the pain and the inflammation with a single shot. Your medical coverage might cover the treatment to help the bulging disc heal.

What If They Don’t Treat a Bulging Disc?

Not seeking immediate treatment for a bulging disc can put a ton of pressure on your spine and lower body. The disc can cut off nerve impulses to your nerves and the cauda equina nerves, which can cause you to lose bowel and bladder control. Developing incontinence from bulged vertebrae is something that you certainly do not want to experience.

Saddle anesthesia isn’t what you get when you sit on a horse for too long, but rather what happens whenever you lose the feeling in your rectum, inner thighs, and the back of your legs.

Admittedly the above cases are sporadic and violent. But in most cases, bulged discs don’t have too many long-term effects. Aside from the pain that happens whenever you deal with an injury to your spine right after an accident, you don’t need to deal with any lingering pain after recovery.

Still, don’t put off seeing a doctor right after a collision because a severe burning disc can severely threaten the spine’s nerves.

Why Hire Us as Your Law Firm?

The time after the accident is usually very vulnerable for those involved. People are healing, mourning, and adapting to the new normal after the accident; this time, most insurers wills will try to trick you and take advantage of your pain and suffering with your bulged or herniated disc.

Insurance companies want to avoid paying you the money you rightfully earned after the accident and pressure you into settling out of court for much less money for your pain and suffering. Our spinal cord injury attorneys share the fruits of our excellent attorney-client relationship. Our team respects your time and gives you time to heal without wasting that time or giving ground to the insurers. We can also work around your injury for a free case review and consultation call.

We request the police report and create a schedule of the crash events, showing the expenses and the timeline of the accident. We then give this to the company as an offer for your bulging disc. We place all the evidence supporting your side of the car accident story into a package and then give this to the opposing attorney. By organizing the chaotic events of the car crash into a cohesive timeline, we can show off the case from its proper angles. Once the story is told, the negotiations over your spine injury begin.

How Do Our Team Handle Negotiations?

Once our team of car accident lawyers shares everything with the necessary agent, they usually look at the risk involved and present a low-balled counteroffer. You can accept, refuse, or make a counteroffer once our accident lawyers get back to you. The negotiations might go on for a while, but we can ensure that we keep you in the loop through your pain and suffering. That’s what a good accident lawyer is for.

If negotiations aren’t working well, we can file a civil lawsuit on your behalf and then take the case to court. An injury lawsuit is a way to get more money, as insurance companies can offer more to cover the risks of potential losses versus the costs of the trial.

Once we finish the case, we sign a settlement release, and the herniated disc cases for the crash are to be dismissed.

The Worth of a Bulging Disc

Our attorneys have found that a bulged vertebra is worth around $15,000 to $30,000 when given an average settlement out of court. The average jury award is approximately $31,000. These are the averages; of course, every case is different. A bulging disc is also much lower in terms of your settlement whenever we compare it to herniated disc cases in a crash.

With that amount of money on the line, you need to hire a law firm that is not afraid to fight for you and your needs. That firm is our firm because we can help you get the money you deserve for your bulged spine. We also try to foster an excellent attorney-client relationship, whether you suffer disc injuries or something else.

Why Should I Hire a Personal Injury Attorney?

A bulged disc is a significant case that requires a lot of attention from a specialized car accident lawyer. This isn’t a case your local claims court can handle, and you shouldn’t try to take on insurance companies alone.

Hiring our law firm means you don’t have to fight insurers on your own while dealing with the pain and suffering of a herniated disc. We know herniated disc injuries very well, and that’s one of the perks of working with Ehline Law.

Additionally, you pay nothing upfront. We only get paid our attorney’s fee after you win your case and your money is in your pocket. It would help if you didn’t worry about costs while handling all the other problems and pain and suffering a car accident brings your way. You need to heal from herniated disc injuries and know you will pay us based on the average settlement.

You don’t know the exact value of your bulged or herniated disc injuries right away because every single case is unique. As we gather evidence about the crash and the circumstances of your post-wreck life, we will be able to put together a settlement plan that covers all of your pain and suffering.

Does Having an Attorney Mean I Have to Go to Court?

Despite all the terms like ‘plaintiff,’ ‘defendant,’ and ‘attorney’ floating around, only about 5% of all injury claims go to court. There, a jury and judge hear them and decide verdicts for them. They often settle most cases through out-of-court settlements and other means to determine who will receive the money, such as forking over the average payment. Mediators, judges, and negotiations settle on your behalf. It’s a lot of back and forth and negotiation, but we can eventually get a fair closing settlement.

Talk to Our Team Right Away

After you have dealt with healing from the accident and sought emergency treatment for your wounds, you need to talk to our team. Our injury lawyers are some of the best in the area, and we can get you the compensation you deserve. Keep any evidence, including site pictures from the wreck and medical documents, away from insurers, and show them to us first.

Our staff will speak to the insurance agency for you, so allow all the communication to go through us. This allows all the experts in the field to communicate. They are wise to the tricks of the insurance agency. Plus, it also gives you time to rest from your pain and suffering and plan your next move once you recover from your bulged disc.

Conclusion

These types of back injuries can be worth hundreds of thousands to millions in monetary exposure. Insurers don’t want to pay you for a bulged disc, and if they do pay, it ends up not being much. Instead of fighting an uphill and ultimately futile battle against an insurance company, you need to come to see our law firm so we can fight for you.

We can have a much easier time of it and see more success, which means more earnings on your end. Call the Ehline Law Firm today at (213) 596-9642 to see how we can help with a herniated or bulging disc following an accident.