Knee Injuries from Car and Motorcycle Accidents: Settlements and More
Justin Ziegler, Lawyer
Actors.
If someone’s negligence caused your knee injury, you may be entitled to compensation.
A video of this article is below:
The knee is one of the biggest and most complex joints in our body.
If you injure your knee in an accident, you want to the best settlement possible. To have the best chance at getting a good payout, you need a crash course on knee injury cases. Without understanding the basics, the insurance company will not offer you fair compensation for the case.
Here, I am going to share some valuable tips that I’ve learned from settling many knee injury cases.
You Only Get Pain and Suffering if Someone Else Caused Your Knee Injury
As a starting point, I estimate the full value for the pain and suffering component for settlement purposes of a personal injury claim from a Florida auto accident. Basically, I look at the value assuming that I the knee injury is 100% related to the accident.
Important Factors in Car Accident Claims for Knee Injuries
In a car accident case where you’re claiming a knee injury, the insurance company may use one or more defenses. They will use these arguments to pay you as little as possible.
These defenses are typically not all or nothing. This means that an adjuster usually won’t offer you nothing just because they have a defense.
However, they may drastically discount the value of your case based on their defenses. (I’m not saying that I agree with their defenses.)
If you think that an insurance company is improperly using a defense, consider filing a consumer complaint. This, among other things, gets the claims manager to review your file.
Here are some of the most common defenses in knee injury cases from car accidents.
Little damage to the car(s) may mean a smaller settlement offer
In a knee injury car accident case, the responsible party’s insurance company will look at the amount of damage to the car that you were in at the time of the accident.
If there was minor damage to it, the car insurance company will likely claim that a knee injury couldn’t have been caused by the crash.
I’ve had State Farm claim that there is a question as to whether a knee injury can be caused from the crash if there was only $800 of damage to the claimant’s vehicle.
Certain types of vehicles may suffer less damage in an accident. This may be true for Jeep or other vehicles that have a hitch on the back. If you were in a vehicle with a hitch, and the vehicle suffered minor damage, mention this to the adjuster.
If the car that you were in didn’t sustain much damage, look at the damage to the other vehicle(s) involved.
Sometimes the liable driver’s insurance adjuster will argue that you were in a minor accident just because your vehicle wasn’t badly damaged. They may fail to mention that the other car’s insured was badly damaged.
State Farm and other insurance companies have done this with me. If the other car suffered big damage, point this out to the adjuster. It may help you get a better settlement offer.
Delay In Getting Your Initial Treatment Hurts Your Case
If you waited days to get your initial medical treatment for your knee injury, expect the responsible driver’s insurer to use this against you. I’ve had State Farm claim that a 9+ day delay in initial treatment raises a question as to whether a car accident caused a knee injury.
Can a Rear-End Accident Cause a Knee Injury?
Car insurance companies may argue that there is an issue of whether a rear-end accident can cause a knee injury. I’ve had State Farm, USAA and Allstate argue that a rear-end crash can’t cause a meniscus tear.
Here is was a meniscus tear looks like.
Let’s look at some knee injury settlements for car, truck and motorcycle accidents.
$300,000 Settlement for Detached Meniscus In Knee, and Leg Fracture, from Car Crash
We settled for $52,000. My client’s eye injury was his worst injury.
$28K Settlement for Knee Injury from Truck Accident
Tom, a 51 year old, was driving a box truck on I-75 in Wildwood, Sumter County, Florida. Jose was driving an 18 wheeler truck headed in the same direction.
The front of Jose’s truck hit the back of Tom’s truck. The crash diagram is below:
American Inter-Fidelity Exchange insured Jose’s employer.
The impact was hard. Tom got an estimate of the damage to his truck. He also took photos of his truck. We sent the estimate and photos to American Inter-Fidelity Exchange.
The following photo shows the damage to the rear of Tom’s truck.
His back pain radiated (went down) into his left leg. The doctor noticed that Tom had muscle spasms.
Due to pain radiating into his leg, his doctor ordered an MRI of the lumbar spine (lower back). He had two bulging discs in his lower back. He also referred Tom to an orthopaedic doctor.
His doctor gave Tom prescriptions for Flexeril (muscle relaxer) and Ibuprofen (pain reliever) to help ease the muscle spasms and pain.
We claimed that the accident caused or aggravated pain in Tom’s neck, back and elbows. The doctor ordered an MRI of his knee. An image of the knee MRI is below.
We also claimed that the collision worsened the pre-existing chondromalacia in his knee.
After the accident, he had an MRI of his knee. It revealed joint effusion (water on the knee). Henry also claimed that the accident caused or aggravated a two herniated discs in his lower back.
Pedestrian Hit By Van Gets $8,000 for Knee Injury and Other Injuries
Our client was standing in a car dealership parking lot in Miami-Dade County, Florida. A mini van backed up. It hit him at an idle (slow) speed.
Our client’s knees buckled and he fell to the ground. He complained of lower back pain.
He Had a Knee Surgery Before the Accident
A few months prior to this accident, he had knee surgery. Immediately after this accident, he complained of knee pain. He did not have any swelling in his knee.
For illustration only.
Miami-Dade Fire rescue came to the scene. Our client walked to the ambulance stretcher. He was put on a backboard.
The paramedics put a neck collar on our client. They transported him to Homestead Hospital.
Knee injury complicated by prior injury and surgery
Patellar Dysfunction
Often Easier to Prove that Knee Fractures Are Related to the Accident
If you have a fracture – as opposed to a tear – it is usually easier to prove that the accident caused the fracture. Some fractures that occur around the knee are:
You Get Full Value for Pain and Suffering by Looking at Past Jury Verdicts
Actors
I use the following numbers as a starting point only for the full value of various knee injuries that were caused by someone else’s negligence in a Florida accident.
I found the full values by doing past jury verdict research for Florida accidents with similar injuries.
She claimed that the accident caused or aggravated her ACL sprain/tear. She had other injuries.
GEICO paid $10,000 to settle her injury claim. Windhaven Insurance paid $10,000 to settle her injury claim.
How much do insurance companies pay for a PCL (posterior cruciate ligament) strain or tear?
A posterior cruciate ligament may be injured from an impact to the front of your knee while its bent. This frequently happens from car accidents.
For example, a PCL tear could happen if you are getting into a car and the driver drives off before you get in. If you strike the front of your knee, you may suffer a PCL tear. Uber and Lyft passengers, or passengers in general, can suffer a PCL tear.
PCL tears can cause pain, swelling, and knee instability. A PCL tear happens less often than an ACL tears.
Physical therapy is frequently the most effective treatment for a PCL tear.
As with all tear cases, look at the MRI report to see how it describes the PCL tear. If the MRI calls it an acute PCL injury, this means that the injury is recent. This is good for your personal injury case if the MRI was done shortly after the accident.
A subacute PCL tear is one that has existed for at least 6 weeks but less than 3 months. A chronic PCL injury is one that has been present for more than 3 months.
Let’s say that your injure your knee in a car accident. Somewhere between 42 and 89 days later, you get an MRI. It shows a subacute PCL tear. Your doctor will (hopefully) state that the accident caused this injury. This makes your case easier to prove than if the MRI said that you had a chronic PCL tear.
Lateral trauma to the knee can cause torn medial collateral ligaments, cruciate ligament injury as well as meniscus injury.
Injuries to the MCL are usually caused by a direct impact to the outside of the knee. This injury can cause pain and possible instability to the inner part of the knee.
Meniscal Tears
Damage to a meniscus, the cartilage that cushions the knee, often occurs with twisting or pivoting of the knee. Big tears can cause the knee to lock.
You can stretch or tear your quadriceps tendon or tear your patellar tendon from a direct blow to the front of your knee, falling or landing improperly.
Other knee injuries that you may get from an accident are:
Plica in the Knee
Knee effusion: Fluid buildup inside the knee, usually from inflammation. Any form of arthritis or injury may cause a knee effusion.
Knee bursitis: Pain, swelling, and heat in any of the bursae of the knee. Bursitis frequently happens from overuse or injury.
Online Settlement Calculators for Knee Injuries in Florida Auto Accidents
If you have a serious knee injury from a Florida auto accident, I strongly suggest that you do not value your case based on an online settlement calculator.
