Despite the protection offered by the skull, your brain is surprisingly susceptible to serious injury in any accident involving sudden motion. The frontal lobe, in particular, can take the brunt of any damage in a fall or car crash. While any traumatic brain injury (TBI) may result in major life changes, frontal lobe damage specifically comes with the risk of extreme shifts to personality and physical capabilities. That’s why you need a legal representative to help you hold the at-fault party responsible if you or a loved one suffered this sort of serious head wound.
Causes and Repercussions of Frontal Lobe Injuries
Resting directly behind your forehead, the frontal lobe consists of both a left and right hemisphere. Damage to either side may stem from a range of medical issues, such as 
tumor growth or suffering a stroke, but is often directly caused by physical trauma sustained in accidents.
Either hemisphere of the frontal lobe can be pierced if an object in a collision penetrates the skull. Frontal lobe damage is also possible with “closed” head wounds when absolutely nothing breaks through the skull. The violent force of a car collision or slip and fall are both easily capable of causing tearing damage if the brain quickly whips back and forth. Victims may specifically suffer a frontal lobe injury because of:
- Acts of intentional violence
- Car accidents
- Dangerously defective products that can cause harm to the consumer’s head
- Motorcycle crashes
- Pedestrian or bicyclist injuries
- Premises liability situations like a slip and fall or dog attack
- Sports accidents suffered while playing football, longboarding, etc.
- Truck collisions involving large cargo vehicles with heavy loads
- Workplace accident injuries
The two hemispheres of the frontal lobe work in conjunction with other parts of the body to help you put multi-step tasks into the correct sequence, utilize basic problem-solving capacity, control your emotional impulses, and use reasoning skills. It is critically also responsible for a significant portion of human language skills, and is directly involved in voluntary muscle movements.
Suffering damage to this area of the brain may obviously lead to drastic changes in your quality of life. After an open or closed frontal lobe injury, you may experience difficulty with:
- Accepting alternate solutions to a problem. Frontal lobe injury victims frequently experience “tunnel vision” in only considering one specific type of behavior or action for every situation.
- Communicating effectively, as speech and language arts can be drastically impaired by a frontal lobe wound.
- Concentrating on tasks that require an extended period of time to complete and maintaining motivation to stick with long-term projects.
- Controlling impulses and recognizing that there may be negative consequences to immediately acting on every thought.
- Moving muscles on the opposite side of the body from the frontal lobe injury (damage to the right hemisphere may interfere with moving limbs on your left side, for instance).
- Organizing tasks into the correct sequence, such as following the proper steps to brewing a cup of coffee or taking a shower and then getting dressed.
- Reading social cues and behaving appropriately to the situation.
- Remembering recently acquired information.
- Stabilizing mood, keeping aggression controlled, and refraining from outwardly showing irritability.
How to Protect Yourself After a Frontal Lobe TBI in Virginia
Any of those symptoms are likely to cause problems maintaining steady employment after your injury, and can obviously cause extreme friction with family and friends. Depending on the specifics of your injury and how it has impacted your daily life, there are a number of potential treatments and services to consider. You may need to utilize:
- Cognitive and psychological therapy to provide coping mechanisms for dealing with loss of impulse control, language difficulties, and other detrimental effects from the frontal lobe injury.
- In-home visits from a home care specialist.
- Inpatient rehabilitation services.
- Physical therapy for overcoming loss of motor control.
- Prescription drugs to address emotional issues stemming from the injury like anxiety, depression, and mood swings.
- Round-the-clock care at a nursing home or other long-term care facility in cases of severe injury.
- Surgery in situations where the accident caused a brain bleed or pressure on the frontal lobe.
- Vocational counseling or occupational therapy for assistance in maintaining current employment or finding a new job that can better cater to your needs.
These types of services are typically extremely expensive for the injured party. If you are diagnosed with a frontal lobe injury, the good news is that there are immediate steps to take towards protecting your legal rights and increasing your chances of a financial recovery. After your diagnosis, your next course of action is to call an experienced traumatic brain injury attorney who has handled frontal lobe cases.
These types of injuries are complex and require specific evidence to prove that the frontal lobe damage was caused by negligence and that a specific party owes you damages. That person failed to uphold their basic duty of care by engaging in distracted driving, failing to clean a slippery floor or fix a broken handrail, etc., and as a result you were hurt. With an attorney’s help, you can locate the best potential source of compensation and actively pursue damages from the at-fault party covering:
- Costs for previous and future medical services, including hospital stays, surgeries, medications, and rehabilitation.
- Future earning potential you have lost if the effects of the frontal lobe injury preclude you from going back to work.
- Lost wages during the specific period spent recovering from the injury if you are able to eventually return to your job.
- Pain, suffering, lost quality of life, and other potential non-economic impacts.
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