San Diego Injury Lawyer Blog

A 6th former National Football League player has been diagnosed with traumatic brain injuries similar to what boxers suffer from multiple blows to the head.

Doctors at Boston University School of Medicine studied the brain of Tom McHale and determined that he suffered from traumatic brain injury before his death last May. McHale was 45 and played in the NFL from 1987-1995 for the Tampa Bay Buccaneers.

According to McHale's family, injuries from football and dealing with his pain led to a psychological downturn:

McHale played on N.F.L. offensive lines for nine seasons, most of them with the Buccaneers, before retiring and running several Tampa-area restaurants. According to his widow, Lisa, he developed such chronic pain in his shoulders and other joints that in 2005 he began taking improperly large doses of the painkiller OxyContin, which exacerbated his lethargy and depression and led him to take cocaine occasionally to offset those effects.

McHale spiraled downward, went through drug rehabilitation three times, and died on May 25, 2008, of a lethal — and deemed by the police, accidental — combination of oxycodone and cocaine. His death shocked many former teammates and players, several of whom remembered him as an intelligent and responsible man.

Doctors concluded that McHale's condition was the result of repetitive head trauma. In some cases, McHale's condition can lead to the onset of dementia.

In serious car accidents, people can be subjected to significant forces to their head and brain--not unlike what a boxer or football player experiences. In some cases this leads to concussions. In others, it leads to traumatic brain injuries. It's important to keep McHale's story in mind when we start to see possible signs of traumatic brain injury. In some cases, the injury can progress as severely as McHale's condition.

The American Association for Justice (AAJ) recently released a report for the public describing the dirty tricks insurance companies use to deny or minimize the claims of injury victims.

The tactics described include denying claims, confusing consumers with insurance policy language and interpretation, and delaying claims for as long as possible.

Late Wednesday night a 69-year-old woman was assaulted and stabbed in the neck with a box cutter by the man who had just rear-ended the car the woman was driving. The surprise attack caused the woman to step on the gas to flee and ended up crashing her car head long into a tree. The car accident happened in the Old Town area of San Diego.

Police described the woman's injuries as not life-threatening, although the attack was--at the very least--terrifying and unexpected. The man is described as a Hispanic male, 20-30 years of age, 5 feet 9 inches tall and weighing approximately 160-180 pounds.

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This assault is particularly scary and unnerving. By all accounts the woman was willing to exchange insurance information with the man, had rolled down her window, and was then stabbed.

In a lawsuit filed earlier this week, the City of San Francisco alleged that California insurance companies discriminate against women by charging higher premiums than they charge for men.

The lawsuit argues that the approved health insurance system permits insurance companies to impose "gender ratings" within their pricing policies. Under this system, the City alleges that women pay up to 39% more for health care coverage than men.

The suit pertains to insurance rates for individuals, not group policies.

Currently, ten states outlaw the practice of "gender rating". However, California does not specifically prohibit gender rating.

In response to the lawsuit, spokespeople for the insurance companies stated that their rates are based upon statistics and actuarials that demonstrate that women are more accident-prone and get sick more often than men.

California emergency room doctors have filed a class-action lawsuit against the State of California alleging that California's healthcare system--stretched and burdened by its' thin budget and high demand for services--is about to collapse on itself. The suit comes at a time when hospitals and emergency rooms are closing at alarming numbers, leading to limited emergency care for injured Californians.

The situation is only becoming worse with the State proposing $1.1 billion in cuts to MediCal, California's low-income health payment system.

This is the second lawsuit brought by doctors against the State of California within a year. In the first lawsuit, led by the California Medical Association, doctors were able to obtain an injunction against the State's proposal to cut MediCal reimbursement rates to healthcare providers by 10%. The State instead reduced current reimbursement rates by 1% to 5%.

Emergency room doctors have been particularly hard hit by the healthcare crisis since, unlike other doctors, they cannot chose to turn away low-income patients who rely on MediCal.

Early in the morning today, a San Diego man was seriously injured when he was struck by a car while crossing the street at the intersection of Genesee Avenue and La Jolla Village Drive in the University Town Center area of La Jolla.

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The 70-year-old man was crossing the intersection against a red traffic signal when he was struck by a 1983 Toyota sedan driven by a San Diego woman. The woman had the right of way, saw the man at the last second, but could not stop in time.

The man was transported to the hospital with a fractured left leg.

If you're a pedestrian, please always be careful crossing the street--particularly against a red light. We hope that this gentleman regains his health--fractured bones at his age are particularly serious--but this story provides a reminder of one of the most important rules of the road.

Federal preemption of state laws is a dry subject. It puts lawyers and law students asleep.

However, the consequences of preemption can be both real and significant.

The Supreme Court recently in Riegel v. Medtronic decided that a state tort injury actions for defective medical devices are barred when the FDA grants the device premarket approval through the federal Medical Devices Act.

With such a technical ruling, the national media has largely ignored the far-reaching significance of this ruling. However, MSNBC's Keith Olberman recently took on the federal preemption issue in Riegel--and took the opportunity to bash Bush (shocker!)--in his usual one-sided presentation of facts.

Like Ronald Miller of the Maryland Injury Lawyer Blog, who drew our attention to the video, I'm not a big fan of Olberman. In fact, I'd probably agree to any derogatory term used to describe him and he hasn't been funny or clever since his time on ESPN. But he deserves some credit for taking notice of this ruling.

In an effort to reduce car accidents due to negligence and inattentiveness, California has made text messaging while driving effective today.

A similar law passed earlier in the year made it illegal to drive while talking on a cellular phone handset.

In a separate law going into effect today, drivers are now allowed to fix GPS navigation units on the bottom left or right corners of the windshield. Under the previous law, it was illegal to mount a navigation system anywhere on the windshield.