If you have a teenager, chances are they have an unhealthy attachment to their smartphone device. When you try to talk to them, they’ll typically have their faces glued to their phones, failing to retain anything you just said. The most concerning thing about this is when that time comes for your teen to learn to drive on their own. That is when you want their phones as far away from the steering wheel as possible. Achieving that could be a challenge.

Texting while driving is a far more dangerous distraction when compared to eating, talking, adjusting music (whether it’s changing a song or the volume), or using in-vehicle navigation systems due to the fact that it takes the driver’s eyes away from the road for longer and more often.

If you are driving down a highway, do you think there is ever an occasion when it is safe or wise to shut your eyes for a matter of seconds?

Keeping your eyes on the road is one of the first things we all learn in terms of safe driving. So why would anyone ever think it is appropriate to text when behind the wheel, or do anything else that takes your attention from driving?

It takes about five seconds, on average, to look at or send a text message. Though that may not require a lot of time, in that small timeframe where your eyes are on your phone instead of on the road, a vehicle traveling 55 or more miles per hour is likely to travel the length of a football field. In the blink of an eye, over that distance, life can be taken — possibly even your own.

It is not always that easy to talk to a teen, just like it is not that simple to make them actually listen. However, there are several ways to help guide them in the right direction and avoid texting while driving at all costs.

It is important that you talk to your teen about the dangers of texting while driving. Never just assume teenagers know texting and driving do not mix. Try to casually bring it up through a family discussion — ideally before your teen even begins to drive. Make the rules clear and concise: No texting or talking on the phone while driving unless it is an emergency.

If you set rules, you cannot forget about the consequences. The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration suggests telling your teen that driving is a privilege — one he or she could easily lose if she does not follow your conditions. There are three very important things that can take away a teen’s freedom while also teaching them a valuable lesson: their cellphone, their driver’s license, and their keys. Let your kids know that if you find out if they have been driving while sending out texts, you will not hesitate to take all three away.

Make sure that you are aware of the laws in your state. Texting and driving might not just be against the rules in your household, but also against the law. Texting and driving is illegal in 43 states, yet the number of texting and driving accidents has still not declined significantly over the past couple of years.

Remember your responsibility as their role model. Although it may not seem like it is the case at times, teenagers actually listen to their parents and are influenced by certain actions they take and words they say. It is in your best interest to practice what you preach. Taking your own advice will show that it is not just a hazard for them to text and drive, but for you as well. Put your phone away every time you get in the car and never text and drive unless you want your teen driver to follow in your footsteps. Parents can have a tremendous influence on their kids. You can make it clear that it is unacceptable for them to be on their phone, but setting a good example is just as powerful, if not more so. Staying off the phone should be the rule for everyone.

In today’s world of innovative and fast-paced technology, it’s no wonder there is an app for just about everything. With this being said, there are phone apps that have been created for you to be able to track texting and driving. New technology allows parents to monitor speed and texting while teen drivers are in their cars. There are also convenient apps where parents can receive text and email alerts if their teen happens to be speeding or texting while in a moving vehicle. They even have apps like TXTShield, which is basically useful when a driver reaches a designated speed (they can select speeds ranging between 10 and 40 miles per hour, in increments of 5), the app shuts down the phone’s capability to text. Incoming texts do not show up on the home screen, and the app sends an automatic response to the person who texted the driver, letting them know that they are in the middle of driving and will get back to them when it is safe to do so.

Be careful when you call or text them. Try your best to resist the temptation to call or text if you think there’s a slight possibility your child is behind the wheel. They probably know you’d get mad if you attempted to get a hold of them and they didn’t pick up. Chances are they will answer your call or reply to your text even when their foot is pressed up on the gas pedal.

Nowadays, most people, especially teens, are reliant on the GPS app on their phones. Tell your teen that if they depend on their smartphone for navigation that they should invest in a device to mount the phone onto the dashboard of the car, putting the screen at eye level and keeping it out of hands and laps. A lot of vehicles now also come with the option to have a built-in navigation system, which can be very helpful in these situations.

If your teen has to answer or make a call while driving, consider getting them a bluetooth microphone system in order for them to use their smartphone’s voice activation commands in a safer way.

Texts and phone calls let you know you are needed and important and most people cannot help but look to see who needs them. It is our human nature, but we must inform our teens that it is also the cause of thousands of deaths and hundreds of thousands of injuries every single year across the United States.

Our legal team at Wolf & Pravato want you and your teens to stay safe and be aware of the dangers of texting and driving!

A Traumatic Brain Injury, (TBI), is any injury to the head that corrupts the normal functioning of the brain. This could either be a violent blow or bump, which can lead to a sudden jolt, or the type of penetrating injury which goes through the skull as well as the brain tissue. TBI’s have the capacity to range from mild (commonly referred to as a concussion) to severe in its potential outcomes of unconsciousness or memory loss. The people most at risk of traumatic brain injury are children, especially newborns to 4-year-olds. Next would be young adults, especially those between ages 15 and 24.

Those who find out they have mild to moderate brain injuries are two times more likely to have developed issues when it comes to their attention span, and those with severe injuries are five times more likely to develop secondary ADHD.

The effects of TBI on children differ in more than a few ways from the effects on an injured adult due to the fact that the child’s brain is not fully developed , therefore an injury may alter the course of growth of the brain and its functions. It is unclear whether or not this works in the child’s favor. Because the child’s brain is less structured than the typical adult’s, its malleability gives off hope that damaged tissue and areas of deficiency will be eluded in the child’s brain by other sections taking over for these areas that no longer function properly.

After a brain injury, previously learned information, which implements essential building blocks for consecutive learning, is maintained and utilized. Despite this being mentioned, in extremely young children, these building blocks are relatively few, handicapping them as learners in comparison to similarly brain-injured older kids or adolescents, who have greater basis of intact information.

The results of a TBI on the child can go unnoticed immediately upon injury, but only become more obvious in the child’s life when, during the course of the child’s development, affected skills are to be demonstrated. For example, issues surrounding abstract thinking may not be apparent until the child with a TBI hits an age when abstract thinking becomes a part of the realm of possibility for any child at that developmental level.

Because of this lag in the surfacing of problems, the cause of the problems (the TBI) may not be established. It is typical that most problems are handled inappropriately as if they are due to learning disabilities or emotional causes. This misconception by teachers, parents, and others can potentially devastate the child, since the strategies meant to assist a child with TBI are separate from those used to address similar issues which stem from other causes.

Call if you need counsel for a Child Brain Injury Lawsuit

A child can suffer in two ways: feeling diminished or confused because no is aware of what is wrong, and being hindered as a student trying to learn because of the lack of nurturing incorporated in the process of learning based on understanding his or her real needs.

Serious internal head injuries may have the potential to become life-threatening. These include a broken skull bone, torn blood vessels, or damage to the brain itself. Infants and young children with brain injuries might not be able to communicate the headaches, sensory problems, confusion and similar symptoms they may be experiencing.

It can be hard to know how serious a head injury is, so it’s always wise to call your doctor.

Symptoms and How to Act

Make sure to dial 911 if your child reveals any of these symptoms following a head injury:

• unconsciousness for more than a matter of seconds
• irregular breathing patterns
• serious wound or scar
• bleeding or clear fluid from the nose, ear, or mouth
• dysfunction of speech or vision
• pupils of unequal proportion
• weakness or paralysis
• neck pain or stiffness
• seizure

If your child appears to be unconscious:

• It is advised not to try to move your child in the case that there is a neck or spine injury.
• Call for help.
• Turn a child who is vomiting or having a seizure onto his or her side while attempting to keep the head and neck straight. This will help prevent the possibility of choking and helps with protection in case of neck and spine injury.

If your child appears to be conscious:

• Try your best to keep your child calm and still.
• If there is any blood, apply a clean or sterile bandage.
• Do not attempt to cleanse the wound, which can make bleeding worse and/or cause serious complications if the skull is fractured.
• Do not apply direct pressure to the wound if you suspect the skull is fractured.
• Do not remove any object that’s stuck in the wound.

It is nearly impossible to prevent kids from injury, but there are methods to lessen the chances of head blows.

It can be as simple as buckling your child into your vehicle using a child safety seat, booster seat, or seat belt (depending on the child’s height, weight, and age). For the utmost protection, infants and toddlers should be buckled in a rear-facing car seat in the back seat, until they end up reaching the upper weight or height limits of their seat. Check the seat’s owner’s manual and/or labels on the seat for weight and height limits.

Furthermore, it is also recommended to make sure that your home is childproofed to prevent household accidents, and that your kids always remember to put on the proper headgear and safety equipment when riding their bikes, skating, skateboarding, snowboarding or skiing, and playing sports.

Following a head injury, do not allow your child to partake in rough play or sports again until the doctor approves. If your child reinjures the brain while it is still in the healing process, it will take an even longer amount of time to fully heal.

If you or a loved one has been the victim of a Fort Lauderdale raumatic brain injury, it is important to know who to contact for the sake of you or the patient’s personal brain injury legal case. In areas of South Florida, you can find a traumatic brain injury attorney at the office of Wolf & Pravato and receive a free, no-obligation, confidential consultation. We can look into your unique case and go in full detail of your rights and options.

Having an experienced lawyer in the area of brain injury can make all the difference in your specific case. The legal team at Wolf & Pravato is here to help guide those with various brain injuries in their traumatic brain injury lawsuit cases. Our ultimate goal is to give our clients the resources that they require in order to recover as fully as possible from the conflicting outcomes of such a traumatic brain injury. It is better to act sooner rather than later.

WARNING!!

After bracing yourself with long lines, you finally got your holiday shopping out of the way. Now that you are done finding the gifts and wrapping them, you can relax – or so you think.

For whoever is tearing through their presents, the last thing you want or need is for them to hurt in  themselves because the product that was purchased is unsafe. Unfortunately, some bad products that are given as gifts may be precarious to those who purchase them due to hazardous materials, dangerous design, malfunctioning parts, or other reasons.

Manufacturers tend to speed up their manufacturing process in order to develop just enough products to satisfy the holiday shopping craze. In many instances, they end up not only compromising the quality of products produced, but also neglecting to look after manufactured goods for potential hazards or defects.

The area of law that deals with unpredictable products that are sold and put into the stream of commerce is called product liability. Products should always be safe for consumers when they are in proper usage. Product liability is a breach of trust that could require legal action. If this is the case, you can always turn to the Law Offices of Wolf & Pravato for a product liability claim and injury lawyer. There are consumer dangerous product rights and laws. When determining whether you have a legitimate defective product liability claim along with prepping your case, it is in your best interest to make yourself familiar with what the certain product safety law requires you to demonstrate in order to win your product liability case.

Although the specifics of what you have to prove vary within each and every state, for the most part, products liability law demands that you prove all of the following things (these are referred to as the “elements” in your claim) to win:

• You were injured or endured losses.
• The product is defective.
• The defect was the cause of your injury.
• You were utilizing the product as intended.

Safety should always be your top priority, so it is advised to seek medical attention as soon as the case of an injury occurs. Make sure to keep records of every emergency room and doctor’s visit, and request physical copies of your visit summaries, your patient chart, and the results of any diagnostic tests such x-rays or MRI reports before you leave.

If you do not have a monetary loss or you are not injured, you would be lacking an essential element of a products liability claim. Let’s face it – the proof is in the pudding, and without actual injury or damage, you have no claim. The moment you are out of immediate danger and all product parts and information are put away, write down the nature of your injury. Write a detailed account of the events leading up to the injury and of the occurrence itself. You can use this accident report template.

If anyone so happened to be present when you got hurt, remember to ask them for a written account, too. Let them know you might need them as your witness.

Electronically time and date stamp it by emailing everything you documented to someone you trust. All will become part of the body of evidence necessary should you choose to go after a product liability lawsuit.

The states that must also find a way to prove that the bad product that injured you is defective. How easy this is to prove has to do with the kind of bad product injury claim you make.

If you are claiming that the product was faulty due to an error in making it, proving that it is defective or the product is dangerous may be relatively easy. If you claim that the product was manufactured properly, but the design of the product is faulty, your evidence may be harder to come by. Most likely, you’ll have to demonstrate that the danger enacted by its design was uncalled for.

Bad Product Lawsuit / Bad Product Claim Examples

1. Recall Due to children choking hazard
2. Johnson and Johnson Baby Powder Lawsuit
3. Baby Jogging Stroller Lawsuit

Even if a product is dangerous in some way it does not always mean the manufacturer or supplier is liable for injuries.

Establishing whether a design is unreasonably dangerous can be simple or tricky. Sometimes there is no fair or cost-effective method to design a much-needed product without it being somewhat dangerous. According to Nolo, the legal encyclopedia, “Air bags in automobiles can cause serious injuries, but their relatively low cost and effectiveness at saving lives in certain types of collisions provide car manufacturers with the grounds to argue that they are not unreasonably dangerous, particularly in view of the alternatives.” There are regulations for how products are made, packaging and product materials.

If you can somehow show that the dangerous product quality is not apparent to a regular consumer, your chances are higher in proving the defectiveness of the injury-inducing product’s design. In certain cases, liability may depend on whether the warnings and instructions provided by the manufacturer or supplier were adequate.

Your argument is not sufficient if you claim that you were injured while using the defective product. You must specifically exhibit that your injury was caused by the defect itself.

In some situations, linking the defect in the product to your injury is fairly straightforward. In other situations, it may require more effort to explain. For example, if you were injured in a car wreck while driving a car that is bound to flip over when turning corners, and there is evidence that you were speeding when the accident happened, the car manufacturer will argue that your reckless driving, not the car’s design, was what caused your accident.

You must have been using the product in a way that the manufacturer intended consumers to use it. This does not necessarily mean that the way you were using the product at the time of your injury must defer to the manufacturer’s specifications. If a manufacturer can expect the average consumer to utilize the product in the same way you did, it is likely that you met this requirement.

When it comes to holiday toys, keep toys with tiny parts that can come apart and be swallowed away from small children. Avoid toys with magnetic parts. Hospitals have witnessed a pattern of children and adolescents swallowing high-powered magnets that lead to serious illness and enter intestine and stomach linings. Wheeled gifts such as bicycles, skateboards and scooters put too many kids in hospitals with sprains and broken or fractured bones. Insist that they use all appropriate safety gear before taking their new presents for a spin. There are alot of consumer product regulations for electronics for both adults and children.

As for packaging, plastic bags in particular presents a suffocation risk, and those silicon packs that are made to take in moisture in product boxes can be harmful if one were to swallow them.

Hire Product Liability Attorney

Assuring that your defective product claim includes every element required in your state may be a handful. Reliant on your specific product liability case, you are going to need to consult with a lawyer who specializes in products liability.

If you find yourself having a product liability claim this holiday season, do not hesitate to contact us. We encourage you to call 954-633-8270 for a free consultation today!