One of the main reasons why people develop traumatic brain injuries (TBI) is car accidents. This can leave you feeling fearful because a brain injury can cause mental, emotional, and physical symptoms. There are numerous signs you can look for to see if you might be suffering from this type of personal injury.
Symptoms of Traumatic Brain Injury
A TBI is a personal injury in which your brain is damaged. It can have mild to serious complications. Sometimes these complications are present immediately after a car accident, but at other times the symptoms may take hours or days to appear.
Physical Symptoms of a TBI
If you’re suffering from a TBI after a car accident, many physical symptoms may appear. They include:
- Dizziness
- Trouble with balance
- Headaches
- You may be bothered by noise and light
- Difficulty with vision
- Vomiting Nausea
- Tinnitus (a ringing sound in your ears)
- A bad taste in your mouth
- It may become difficult to smell.
- Changes in your sleeping habits (You may feel especially tired and like you don’t have much energy, so you start sleeping more than you usually do. It’s also possible that you find it difficult to fall asleep, so you end up sleeping less than you usually do.)
Mental Symptoms of a TBI
It’s also possible that you’ll start experiencing mental changes after being in a car accident where you’ve developed this type of personal injury. Some of these symptoms include:
- Problems with concentration
- Difficulty paying attention to things
- Feeling as though your thinking is sluggish or that you can’t think clearly
- Feeling groggy or foggy
- Difficulties with short or long-term memory
Emotional Symptoms of a TBI
While most traumatic injuries don’t cause emotional difficulties, this isn’t true of a TBI. In fact, when you get a TBI, you may experience some of the following emotional symptoms:
- An unusual amount of anxiety or nervousness
- Feeling easily irritated or angered
- Sadness
- Depression
Signs of a Moderate to Severe TBI
Sometimes a car accident may result in a moderate to serious TBI. This is due to blood clots developing, the tissue being torn or bruised, and bleeding in the brain. Sometimes this can result in long-term complications, or they may even be fatal. What you need to look for here varies between adults and children, but you’ll definitely need a car accident lawyer chattanooga tn.
Signs of a Dangerous TBI in Adults
When you’re looking for signs of this type of personal injury in adults, you should watch for:
- A persistent headache that grows worse over time
- Repeatedly vomiting
- Convulsions
- Seizures
- Clear fluid draining from the nose or ears
- Numbness
- Weakness
- Decreased coordination
- Becoming clumsier than usual
- One pupil that’s larger than the other
- Complete loss of vision in one or both eyes
- Difficulty recognizing people or places
- Confusion
- Agitation
- Restlessness
- Slurred speech
- Drowsiness
- Loss of consciousness
- Difficulty with reasoning or judgment
- Inability to concentrate
- Problems with conducting executive functioning tasks (e.g., planning, problem-solving, multitasking)
- Problems communicating
Signs of a Dangerous TBI in Children
The signs of this personal injury in children are the same as those in adults, but they may also experience others, including:
- Refusing to nurse or eat
- Atypical irritability
- The inability to stop crying
- Being inconsolable
- Inability to pay attention
- Changes in sleeping habits
- Loss of interest in their favorite toys or activities
- Sadness
- Depression
When you have signs of a personal injury after a car accident, you shouldn’t delay seeking treatment and a car accident attorney douglas ga. Your next step should then be to schedule a consultation with us at the Blenner Legal Group in Palm Harbor, FL. We’ll help you get the recovery you deserve from the vehicle accident that you were in.