3 Activities That Increase Your Risk Of Brain Or Spinal Cord Injury

Everywhere you click, you find advice about foods and activities that increase or decrease your risk of certain injuries or illnesses.  Despite clickbait headlines that claim that you will be shocked to find out, most of these are common sense.  Every third grader knows that physical exercise and a diet that includes a variety of fruits and vegetables decrease your risk of cardiovascular disease, while smoking and excessive alcohol consumption increase it.  Many serious health problems creep up on you slowly, so there is time to reverse course and adopt healthy habits before or after you begin to feel the effects of unhealthy ones.  Traumatic injuries to the brain and spinal cord, by contrast, are most often the result of an accident, so preventing these devastating injuries means preventing the accidents that cause them.  If you have suffered a concussion, traumatic brain injury (TBI), or spinal cord injury in a preventable accident, contact a Columbia car accident lawyer.

Trying to Reach a Destination While Drunk

Dr. Brian Hoefflinger is a neurosurgeon who uses his social media accounts to spread awareness about preventing the kinds of injuries that lead patients to his operating table.  In one of his videos, he listed several easily avoidable activities that increase the risk of injury to the head or spinal cord.  First, he noted that a disproportionate number of catastrophic accidents involve alcohol.  Not only are you more likely to crash your car if you drive drunk, but you are also more likely to get seriously injured if you walk on a public road while drunk.  For example, you are more likely to get hit by a car or suffer an accidental fall, since alcohol intoxication makes you less aware of your surroundings.  The safest way to get drunk is to reach your destination first, and then drink your fill.  It is safest to get drunk at home or at a party where you know the host well, and you are sure that the host will call a rideshare ride for you if you are too drunk to drive.

Not Wearing a Seatbelt

Automatic braking systems may be good at preventing accidents, but the best safety feature for reducing the risk of severe injury in an accident is the humble seatbelt.  Seatbelts reduce the risk of brain and spinal cord injury, because these injuries most often occur when a driver or passenger is ejected from the car, and wearing a seatbelt protects you from being ejected.

Insufficient Lighting

Many of Hoefflinger’s patients require emergency surgery after accidents that occurred at night.  Poor lighting increases the risk of pedestrians and bicyclists getting hit by cars.  You also have a greater risk of falling down a hill or a flight of stairs if there is insufficient lighting.

Let Us Help You Today

The personal injury lawyers at the Stanley Law Group can help you if you have been severely injured in a preventable accident.  Contact The Stanley Law Group in Columbia, South Carolina or call (803)799-4700 for a free initial consultation.

Source:

newsweek.com/neurosurgeon-reveals-things-absolutely-avoid-working-trauma-1915250