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Television shows, movies, and even the news outlets have painted slip and fall injuries as nothing but illegitimate claims. But there’s no more truth in these claims being fraudulent than a car accident claim, trip and fall claim, or a workers’ compensation claim.
What happens here is that these media outlets have become more concerned with protecting the business that either intentionally or unintentionally created an unsafe environment than they are with protecting the public. Fortunately, there are Cincinnati, OH personal injury attorneys that handle these cases frequently and provide fair representation to the victims of these falls.
The Myth of Slip and Fall Fraud
As with any attempt to recover compensation or make a claim against an insurance company, there are definitely people out there looking to defraud the system. But that isn’t most people. It’s not even a substantial amount of people. There are not outlandish claims on every single report of a slip and fall.
National news sources are reporting that there’s a severe rise in slip and falls, specifically noting that they usually claim through workers’ compensation. But in that same report, they admit that the majority of these claims are legitimate accidents where the property owner may be liable.
Stats on Slip and Falls in the U.S.
The most serious injuries from a slip and all is a fracture, although many people experience joint issues as well from a fall. These are the leading employee claims in workman’s compensation, although the highest “at-risk” segment is elderly people.
The most common issue that relates to slip and falls or leads to slip and falls is the floor materials. Meaning that non-porous flooring material contributes to falls more than any other element, such as the liquid on the floor itself. That’s often because material such as granite or tile will allow the liquid to pool even in small amounts. So mopping a floor in a tile walkway will leave the floor wet for possibly hours rather than a matter of a few minutes.
Serious Injuries That Come With Slip and Fall Claims
Fractures are more serious than people believe while most of the population has broken a bone on some level, these injuries can lead to infections, limited motion, and for elderly people even more complications.
The estimate is that about 95% of all hip fractures are a result of falling, usually slipping and falling, which results in a sideways fall. Hip fractures will almost always result in long hospital stays and multiple surgeries. These injuries can fully change life.
Difficulty in Proof
Part of the proof element is proving that the property owner was both negligent and that they should have been more careful. Usually, business owners will work hard to show that they do their absolute best to take care of their premises. So it’s on the victim to build a case around their injuries and showing that it was not reasonable for them to avoid the slip and that property owner should have taken greater care.
Risks to Older Americans and Prevention
As mentioned, the bigger issue is always around the elderly community. While a younger person could recover from a fracture or coordinate a recovery program. Older Americans and disabled Americans pose the greatest risk of slipping and falling. But, those falls happen most often at home, and the goal in that vein is prevention.
Changing the flooring material is one of the top things that people can do to prevent falls. But business owners should take extra steps by laying down absorbent rugs in areas that are known to attract water as well as mopping up spills right away. If the spill happened because someone failed to mop a spill or set up a station to warn people of a spill, then they were negligent. There are additional things that business owners can do to prevent slip and falls.
When to Contact a Cincinnati Personal injury Lawyer
Those who are recovering from a slip and fall might be thinking about hiring a local law firm that deals with slip and fall cases or trying to work out how to handle the hospital bills on their own. It’s not uncommon for people to feel as if the fraud suspicion is so high that they couldn’t possibly get the compensation they need. But that’s not true. Premises liability puts the owner of the property or establishment as the liable party. They owed you a level of care to create a safe space, and they failed.
Contact the Cincinnati offices of Young, Reverman & Mazzei to get your case moving.
