Toll-Free: (800) 606-1717
Phone: (248) 569-4646
The Michigan brain injury lawyers at our firm represent clients who have suffered traumatic brain injuries in all types of accidents. These include car accidents, motorcycle accidents, slip and fall accidents, and even recreational accidents, like snowmobile and ATV accidents.
Braininjury victims many times sustain actual physical injuries for traumatic brain injuries, but after a period of time, doctors are unable to find an objective basis for ongoing physical complaints of pain. This means that diagnostic studies, like SPECT scans, CT scans, and MRIs show normal results, but the patient still has ongoing symptoms and problems. One possible explanation for these ongoing physical complaints of pain are known as a somatoform disorder and more specifically, conversion disorder.Somatoform disorders are physical complaints of pain, nausea, depression, dizziness, etc. for which medical doctors cannot find an objective explanation.
Typically, an injury victim's complaints of pain are serious enough to cause significant emotional distress and impairment of social and/or occupational functioning. Conversion disorder is classified as one of the somatoform disorders in the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders of the American Psychiatric Association, Fourth Edition, Text Revision (DSM-IV TR).
The Mayo Clinic has described conversion disorder as a psychiatric condition in which people express emotional distress through physical signs and symptoms. These physical manifestations appear involuntarily and a medical examination does not show any clearly defined physical cause for the complaints of pain or dysfunction. Conversion disorder afflicts women more often then men and is common among people between the ages of 10 and 35 years of age.
One of the key aspects of somatoform disorders, including conversion disorder, is significant functional impairment. In fact, by way of definition, somatoform disorder such as conversion disorders require significant functional impairment which is important in the scheme of the Michigan no-fault system for both no-fault insurance claims and third party personal injury claims. Another key aspect to somatoform disorders is the fact that these disorders are not based on an injured victims malingering and cannot be defined as a fictitious disorder. Typically, insurance companies and/or defendants try to suggest that traumatic brain injury victims are exaggerating, faking, or simply making up their symptomology. This is often referred to as malingering.
If a person is suffering from a conversion disorder, then this would be an explanation for any suggestions of malingering and explain why it is not malingering. It is important that injured victims seek the appropriate medical and/or psychiatric treatment to fully investigate all potential reasons for their ongoing complaints of pain and symptomology.
Many brain injury lawyers do not understand these medical issues and therefore it is necessary that you hire a Michigan brain injury lawyer that is familiar with all of the important issues in representing brain injury patients. If you suffered a brain injury in an accident, you should contact our firm immediately.
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We represent Michigan personal injury clients in Detroit, Southfield, Pontiac, Troy, Warren, Grand Rapids, Muskegon, Lansing, East Lansing, Battle Creek, Kalamazoo, Bloomfield Hills, West Bloomfield, Farmington Hills, Rochester, Auburn Hills, Clarkston, Birmingham, Ferndale, Flint, Novi, Pontiac, Troy, Utica, Saginaw, Sterling Heights, Waterford, Wayne, Dearborn, Westland, Canton, Monroe, Ann Arbor, Mount Clemens, Livonia, Grayling, Grosse Pointe, St. Clair Shores, Brighton, Adrian, Allen Park, Clinton, Hamtramck, Northville, Garden City, Southgate, Harrison, Holland, Inkster, Allen Park, Belleville, Jackson, Madison Heights, Mount Pleasant, Oak Park, Okemos, Plymouth, Redford, Roseville, Romulus, Royal Oak, Taylor, Wyandotte, Wyoming, Traverse City, Ypsilanti, Bad Axe, Northern Michigan, as well as residents of Wayne County, Kent County, Oakland County, Macomb County, Washtenaw County, Genesee County, Huron County, St. Clair County, Monroe County, Ingham County, Saginaw County, Livingston County, Lenawee County and all other Michigan counties.
