California Brain Injury Lawyers

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For several decades, Masry & Vititoe has represented those who have been seriously injured. Through experience and education, our firm is able to expertly evaluate medical injuries and pursue personal injury claims on behalf of the injured plaintiff. Masry & Vititoe provides sophisticated legal services for almost any type of medical injury. We not only handle claims for plaintiffs with obvious injuries, but we also vigorously pursue the more challenging and less obvious injuries such as brain injuries, traumatic brain injuries and closed head injuries.

James Vititoe, partner, focuses his legal expertise on medical injury cases. Over the past 20 plus years, Jim has specialized in civil tort litigation, including wrongful death, work-related injuries, and other types of personal injuries. Recently, his focus and specialty has been brain injury and head injury cases including severe and mild traumatic brain injuries [MTBI].

Trauma is the leading cause of death in the United States for people between the ages of 1 and 44 and it is the third leading cause of death overall, and statistics show that there are approximately 2 million brain injuries reported each year in this country. Of those reported brain injuries, over 51,000 were fatal and 20 - 30% of the surviving victims suffered permanent, irreversible disabilities. Physical and emotional damages resulting from traumatic brain injuries may eventually be reversed but unfortunately many victims of brain injury suffer some type of permanent irreversible damage. It is reported that currently there are more than 5 million people in the United States who are permanently disabled due to the effects of a brain injury.

Brain injuries may result in:

• Paralysis
• Loss of voluntary or involuntary motor functions
• Loss of reasoning and thinking abilities
• Memory loss
• Sensory loss such as sight, speech or hearing
• Emotional disabilities including depression, anxiety, post traumatic stress disorder, etc.

The most common types of head injuries are:

Concussion: Concussion is an alteration of consciousness, transient or prolonged, due to a blow to the head that may be followed by transient amnesia, vertigo, nausea, and weak pulse. Breathing often is unusually rapid or slow. Outward evidence of the injury may include bleeding and contusions (bruises). When consciousness is regained, the victim is likely to have severe headache and, possibly, blurred vision. If severely injured, the victim may lapse into a coma. Concussions often occur in sports related injuries.

Anoxic Brain Injury: Anoxic Brain injury is caused when the oxygen supply to the brain is cut off. This can occur from an absence of oxygen intake or the inability of the blood stream to transport oxygen to the brain. Swimming and diving accidents and complications in surgery can cause an anoxic brain injury.

Traumatic Brain Injury: Traumatic Brain Injury results from rapid acceleration and deceleration of the brain, including shearing (tearing) of nerve fibers, contusion (bruising) of the brain tissue against the skull, brain stem injuries, and edema (swelling). Motor vehicle accidents are the leading cause of traumatic brain injuries. Traumatic brain injury is often referred to as TBI.

Motor vehicle accidents are the leading cause of brain injury in the United States and many motor vehicle accidents are caused by negligence. When negligence is the cause of a traumatic injury, the victim may be entitled to recover all their damages due to another's negligence including all current and future medical costs, property damage, pain and suffering, loss of current and future earnings, loss of enjoyment and in some cases, punitive damages, Families of the victim may also be entitled to be compensated for damages if, due to the injury, they are forced to change their circumstances and lifestyle in order to care for their loved one.

While motor vehicle crashes account for almost half of all brain injuries, more than 300,000 sport-related traumatic brain or head injuries occur annually in the United States. It is becoming increasingly evident that injuries due to sports related accidents can lead to severe and often irreversible complications yet many high school and college sports coaches and officials have not been given adequate education and training regarding the serious medical risks associated with concussions. Some believe that if the victim has not lost consciousness, they are not seriously injured however medical evidence will show that many times a person will remain conscious even though the injuries to the brain are severe. Medical evidence also shows that once a person has suffered a concussion, the probability of suffering another concussion will be three times higher and some reports suggest that even three concussions will result in permanent and irreversible brain damage. Schools and amateur sports leagues must assume responsibility for negligence in cases where they continue to allow children to "play" a sport even though they knew the child had suffered previous head injuries.

Victims and their families may also be able to file a claim against hospitals, HMOs or physicians if it can be determined that a brain injury resulted from improper and negligent medical procedures or that a brain or head injury was present, but not diagnosed.

Long term care facilities and rehabilitation centers are responsible for providing a safe environment for all brain injury patients under their care. In addition to expecting safe and medically competent care, families often assume that their loved one continues to be in a care facility because of necessity. However, it has been uncovered that some disreputable long term care facilities have purposely kept a patient in their facility for the sole purpose of collecting the medical insurance benefits. The Department of Justice has filed charges against several of these unscrupulous facilities.

Masry & Vititoe believes that in order to represent our brain injury clients in the best possible manner, our firm must have an understanding of the human anatomy and how it responds to an injury to the brain. Therefore, through experience and education, our firm is able to expertly evaluate traumatic brain injuries and successfully pursue claims on behalf of the injured plaintiff.

While proving a physical, emotional, or cognitive injury can be difficult, our experienced and knowledgeable traumatic brain injury attorneys and staff are able to undertake difficult cases and prevail, convincing skeptics of the merits of a claim via credible, trustworthy evidence and objective test findings. Our firm is committed to protecting our client's rights and has repeatedly demonstrated our ability to succeed in the most challenging and complex traumatic brain injury cases.

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