Experienced Lawyer after South Dakota Car Accidents

Blog Posts, Car Accidents
20 Jun by Steve M. Christensen

Experienced Lawyer after South Dakota Car Accidents

Car accidents change lives forever. Even so-called "minor" car accidents can have major financial impact in terms of property damage, necessary medical expenses and lost wages due to time off work.

For more than 35 years, the Christensen Law Offices has represented South Dakota residents and visitors to the area who need legal help after a car accident. We have represented hundreds of clients in negotiating personal injury settlements with insurance companies and rental car agencies.

We negotiate with insurance companies to get full and fair settlements for car accident victims. The settlement amount you can realistically expect depends to a great extent on how serious the injuries were. Our office has extensive experience building strong cases on behalf of car accident victims with a wide range of injuries:

  • Concussion
  • Whiplash or other soft tissue injuries
  • Broken bones and fractures
  • Air bag injuries
  • Head and back injuries, including traumatic brain injury, herniated discs, and full or partial paralysis

We also file wrongful death claims on behalf of surviving family members in the sad event of a fatal car accident.

At the Christensen Law Offices, our goal is to make you feel at home in our offices as we process your car accident claim. If you are visiting South Dakota from out of state, we will treat you as if you were at home and do everything possible to decrease the inconvenience of having to handle a legal matter from out of state. For all our clients, we work to make our offices a safe place to discuss fears and come up with practical legal options that have the highest chance of bringing a full and fair financial settlement.

We handle all car accident cases on a contingency fee basis. You pay no attorney's fees unless we recover for you.

Blog Posts, Head and Back Injuries
24 May by Steve M. Christensen

Knowledgeable Personal Injury Lawyer in South Dakota For Head and Back Injuries

When an accident results in head or back injuries, it is especially important to seek legal representation from a personal injury attorney with extensive experience negotiating settlements for accident victims with head or back injuries.

Head and back injuries present unique medical issues, and they often require long-term rehabilitative therapy before the victim of the head or back injuries can regain normal function. In the most serious cases of head or back injuries, the victim cannot, in fact, regain full pre-accident function.

For over 35 years, the Christensen Law Offices in Deadwood, South Dakota, has offered compassionate and thorough legal representation to accident victims in Western South Dakota and throughout the United States. We have significant experience representing accident victims suffering from a wide range of head, back and shoulder injuries:

  • Rotator cuff tears
  • Cervical sprains, or back sprains
  • Herniated or ruptured discs
  • Discogenic back pain
  • Bulging discs
  • Spinal fractures or other spinal cord injuries
  • Neck sprains
  • Partial paralysis, or paraplegia
  • Full paralysis, or quadriplegia
  • Concussions
  • Traumatic brain injuries (TBI) — mild, moderate or severe
  • Closed head injury
  • Temporary or permanent brain damage

Thorough analysis of the accident victim's current and future medical needs is essential in all cases involving head or back injuries. This is true no matter how these injuries occur:

  • Car accidents
  • Motorcycle accidents
  • Boating accidents
  • Snowmobile or ATV accidents
  • Slip and fall accidents
  • Workplace accidents
Our office works closely with medical experts, rehabilitation specialists and life care planners to construct a financial demand that accounts for all medical and rehabilitative needs our client will have as a result of the head or back injuries. The personal injury settlement (or workers' compensation claim) is your sole opportunity to get a financial recovery that will cover all your needs as a result of the accident that caused your injuries.

At the Christensen Law Offices, we treat our clients and their families with extreme compassion. At the same time, we take a tough negotiating stance to help our clients get the financial settlement they deserve after an accident causing head or back injuries.

We handle all personal injury cases on a contingency fee basis. You pay no attorney's fees unless we recover for you.

Permanent Disability
1 Apr by Steve M. Christensen

Experienced South Dakota Lawyer for Permanent Disability Workers’ Compensation Cases

The most serious type of workers' compensation claims are when a workplace accident results in such serious injuries that the worker is unable to return to work. In such cases, the workers' compensation claim is known as a permanent disability claim.

Because the permanent disability claim is usually the injured worker's only opportunity to obtain financial resources to replace a lifetime of lost wages, legal help from a knowledgeable workers' compensation attorney is critically important.

For over 35 years, the Christensen Law Offices, in Deadwood, has handled workers' compensation claims in work injury cases throughout South Dakota. The process of making a permanent disability claim and negotiating a fair resolution is extremely complex, and no injured worker is encouraged to go through the process without help from an experienced legal advocate.

In permanent disability workers' compensation cases, there are three main areas in which an experienced attorney can help you get a completely fair resolution:

Impairment rating: If an injury or illness results in permanent disability, your benefits will be computed by a formula using an impairment rating assigned by your doctor. Different ratings are assigned to different impairments such as paralysis, spinal cord injuries, loss of limb, and so forth. The rating your doctor assigns can have a tremendous impact on the level of benefits you receive. Your workers' compensation lawyer can communicate with your doctor about the impairment rating and can also file a summary rating reconsideration petition if the original impairment rating is unfair.

Vocational training: If your permanent disability prevents you from returning to your old job but you may be able to find employment in a different field, the workers' compensation system is required to provide you with funds for education or retraining. Your workers' compensation attorney can protect your rights during any negotiations about retraining.

Compromise and release: This is the term used to describe a final settlement of your permanent disability workers' compensation case. The word "commutation" is also sometimes used. In a compromise and release, the injured worker, the employer and the workers' compensation insurance company agree on a final lump-sum payment. The amount of this payment should be carefully negotiated with help from an experienced advocate.

Losing your ability to earn a living due to a workplace accident is a shocking and life-altering event. If this has happened to your family, turn to the Christensen Law Offices for practical legal advice and calm guidance as you go through the complex workers' compensation claims and appeals process.