What are the main symptoms of a whiplash injury?

If you have been involved in a road traffic accident and are suffering from pain and discomfort in your neck you may be wondering whether you are suffering from a whiplash injury. This article looks at how whiplash injuries are caused, the main symptoms of a whiplash injury and how long it may take you to recover from your whiplash injury.

A whiplash injury usually – but not always – occurs in a road traffic accident where one car has gone into the back of another car. This often happens, for example, where one car is stationary at traffic lights and another car fails to brake in time and collides with the rear of the stationary car. The collision does not have to be particularly forceful to cause a whiplash injury to the driver (and/or passengers) of the stationary car.

A whiplash injury is caused when the head and neck are suddenly and forcefully thrown back and forth (as a result of an accident such as the one in the example above) causing soft-tissue, ligament and muscle damage in the neck. This damage is caused due to the fact that the neck is being stretched beyond its normal range of movement and flexibility.

The symptoms of a whiplash injury are often not apparent immediately and can often take hours, or even days, to appear. Symptoms include restricted movement in the neck, pain and discomfort in the neck and back, headaches, dizziness, giddiness, nausea, lethargy and pins and needles in the hands and arms. If you experience any of these symptoms following a road traffic accident you should visit your local Accident & Emergency Department, or GP, as soon as possible to rule out anything more serious than whiplash and to seek advice on how you should treat your whiplash injury.

Treatment for whiplash often involves gentle mobility exercises, painkillers, physiotherapy or chiropractic treatment. Nowadays surgical collars are rarely prescribed for whiplash injuries as current guidelines state that the neck should be gently mobilised to increase the range of movement. When you instruct a solicitor to help you with your claim they will arrange for you to attend an appointment with an independent medical expert who will assess your injuries, advise you on the best course of treatment, and will prepare a report detailing your injuries. This report will be used to assess the value of your whiplash injury claim.

The amount of time it will take you to recover from your whiplash injury will depend on the severity of your injury. Mild injuries could be fully resolved within a few weeks of the accident whereas more serious whiplash injuries could take months or even years to fully resolve. In the more severe cases, sufferers will be left with lifelong side effects from their whiplash injury.

To summarise, if you think you may be suffering from a whiplash and have some or all of the symptoms described above, you should visit your local Accident & Emergency Department, or GP, as soon as possible so that your injury can be properly treated. You should also seek the assistance of an expert whiplash claims solicitor to help you pursue a claim for compensation.

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