Mistakes To Avoid After a Slip and Fall

Answer:

When somebody slips and falls in New York and has been seriously injured, people make a number of mistakes. As attorneys, we see them every single day in our practice. The first mistake people make is they don’t get immediate medical treatment. Often what happens in a slip and fall is after it happens, the person looks around and is embarrassed. How did this happen? Did anybody see me? They’re not concerned with their injury. They’re not concerned with how badly they’re hurt. They’re concerned with quickly getting up and avoiding the embarrassment that initially flows over them. One of the things we tell people is that when they’re injured in a slip and fall, they need to seek medical care right away.

The second thing we see is, after people get evaluated, they don’t follow through on their medical treatment. People go to the hospital or doctor and they’re told to follow up with their personal care physician or family doctor, and then they don’t. They put it aside, get distracted, and they don’t do what they’re supposed to do. This hurts the value of their claim, as well as whether or not they have a claim at all. The first mistake is not getting immediate medical treatment; the second mistake is not following through.

The third mistake is not seeing an attorney right away. If you come in to see us after a slip and fall, because of someone else’s negligence, one of the things we’ll do is get our investigator out there immediately in order to preserve evidence. What that means is our investigator will talk to witnesses, get photographs of the area. This is particularly important when you’re dealing with snow and ice where conditions can change in a matter of hours or days. It’s very important to get photographs of what that area looked like at the time you fell. If you have your cellphone with you, it’s very important to take out that cellphone and take a picture of what caused you to fall. People don’t do that, and that’s a mistake that people often make.

The three mistakes are not getting an attorney to preserve that evidence right off the bat, not following through with your treatment, and then not getting treatment at all after being seriously injured after a fall.