After you’ve been in a car accident, you have a lot of unexpected things to think about and take care of. If you do not need any immediate medical treatment, it may be easy to assume you do not have any injuries and focus on other things, such as repairing or replacing your vehicle.
However, not all injuries are immediately obvious, especially after a car accident. You might have internal injuries or not start feeling pain until a few days after your accident.
It is important to get to a doctor as soon as possible for a checkup. Having an MRI done as part of your checkup is also highly recommended, for various reasons.
What does an MRI do?
MRI technology can produce images of organs inside your body. An MRI can provide doctors with images of your organs that are commonly injured in a car accident and help detect any problems with your major organs such as your brain, heart and spinal cord.
You may also choose to have procedures such as x-rays or a cat scan done; however, an MRI can catch things that these cannot. There are many common car accident injuries that are identified only after an MRI, such as traumatic brain injuries, a herniated disc or whiplash.
An MRI is an important piece of evidence
An advantage to having an MRI done is that if it does show that you have an injury, the MRI records will be crucial evidence if you decide to pursue a personal injury claim for your damages.
The MRI scans can clearly show the precise injuries you sustained. This can potentially increase the overall amount of damages you can recover.
However, recovering damages means more than just showing proof of your injuries. You must show that the injuries were caused by someone else’s negligence and proving negligence can be challenging. Personal injury attorneys know the factors courts examine when determining negligence and can be strong advocates for car accident victims.