Recent Blog Posts
Who Is to Blame in a Driverless Car Crash?
Driverless cars are thought to be the wave of the future, a way to decrease risks of distracted driving and improve safety. Unfortunately, the world is a long way off from actually realizing such a phenomenon. Case in point: the recent accident involving a bus and a Google autonomous vehicle (AV). This poses some potential setbacks for the company and driverless cars as a whole, but it also leaves many wondering who would be to blame in situations such as this.
About the Crash
While traveling about two miles per hour, the Google AV driver noticed a bus approaching in their left side mirror but mistakenly believed the bus would either stop or slow down to let them pass. The car’s software also apparently thought the bus would stop. Instead, as the Google AV re-entered the center lane, it made contact with the side of the bus, which was operating at about 15 miles per hour at the time of the accident. Sandbags in the road are also thought to be a contributing factor in the accident.
Receiving Compensation in a Hit-and-Run Accident Can Be Difficult But Not Impossible
In a perfect world, every person would take accountability for their actions, all parties in an accident would carry adequate insurance and exchange information, and victims would never have to worry about how they will cover their medical expenses or vehicle repairs. Unfortunately, the world is far from perfect, as indicated by a hit-and-run accident involving an Illinois police officer.
The crash occurred in Hammond, Illinois, and seriously injured a motorcycle rider. The police officer, a 13-year veteran of the Evanston Police Department, was driving his personal vehicle, and was subsequently charged with leaving the scene of an accident resulting in serious bodily injury. The case is currently pending.
Hit-and-Run Accidents on the Rise
Sleep Apnea Sufferers May Have a Higher Risk for Work Injury
According to statistics from the Bureau of Labor Statistics, approximately three million nonfatal workplace injuries and illnesses occur each year. Of those cases, more than half involved missed workdays, job transfers, or work restrictions. Trips and slips, electrocutions, repetitive motion injuries, machine entanglement, vehicle crashes, and falling objects are some of the most common causes, which can affect anyone. However, a new study suggests that sleep apnea sufferers may be especially prone to workplace injuries.
What is Obstructive Sleep Apnea?
Obstructive sleep apnea, a condition that blocks the airway during sleep and then causes wakefulness throughout the night, affects approximately 22 million Americans. Sufferers often experience marked daytime sleepiness and fatigue due to the disruption of the brain’s normal sleeping cycle, but few awaken fully during obstructive episodes. As a result, many cases go undiagnosed.
Unmarked Train Crossing Leads to an Unfortunate but Preventable Accident
Train accidents are rather rare, which makes them exceptionally memorable when they do happen. Such is the case in a recent accident between a truck and a train in Homer, Illinois. Thankfully, no one was injured or killed. The driver of the truck may be due compensation, however, since the accident could have been prevented.
Unmarked Construction
According to the city’s police chief, seven cars had derailed about a week prior to the accident in question. The company that owns the line had allegedly closed the road to clean up the aftermath and fix the problem, but the contractor who was working on the repairs reportedly moved the barricades from both sides and then forgot to return them before leaving. This made it an unmarked construction zone – one with a hole reportedly so deep, it managed to stop the 72-year-old man’s truck as he tried to driver over the tracks.
Pessimism Could Increase Your Risk of a Car Accident, Study Says
Pessimism, or a negative bias, has an impact on almost every aspect of your life, including your mood, relationships, and even your health. Now, science has added a new potential risk for those that see the world as a half empty glass: they may be more prone to experiencing motor vehicle accidents.
Negative Bias Increases Response Time to Negative Stimuli
In the study, researchers from the Chinese Academy of Science’s Institute of Psychology interviewed 38 drivers with at least three years of driving experience. Using the number of penalty points on their driving records, the participants were then split into two groups – 23 were considered “safe” drivers and 15 were considered “dangerous” drivers.
All drivers were asked to view a series of photographs and determine if they had a red border or blue border. Each was meant to incite a negative, positive, or neutral emotion. Those in the dangerous driving group took slightly longer to identify the border colors of negative emotion photographs than those in the safe driving group. According to the authors, this suggests that negative drivers may take longer to respond to negative stimuli while driving.
Makers of Recalled Bath Mat Now Facing Lawsuit
According to public policy, consumers have the right to expect certain measures have been taken to ensure the products they purchase are safe for use. Those measures extend to the product’s design, manufacturing, labeling, and marketing. When companies fail to meet those minimum product safety requirements, they become liable for the injuries or deaths caused.
Recalled AquaRug Bath Mats
According to The Washington Post, Tristar Products, Inc., is currently facing an injury lawsuit over the safety of their AquaRug bath mats. Recalled after 40 online customers filed complaints, the 1.4 million bathmats are said to have faulty suction cups that do not stay in place, which creates a fall risk for consumers. One such consumer reportedly fell while using the AquaRug bath mat.
Despite Increased Risk of Cancer, Firefighters Struggle to Receive Workers’ Compensation
Firefighters: just the word invokes a sense of admiration. They are, after all, some of the only men and women that would rush into a burning building to save a life. But, because they are inhaling smoke, combustion by-products, and ash quite frequently, these very same heroes are also three times more likely than the average person to end up with cancer. The only thing more concerning than that statistic is just how difficult it often is for them to receive workers’ compensation.
National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health Study
In 2013, the National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health (NIOSH) analyzed cancers and cancer deaths of nearly 30,000 firefighters from the Chicago, Philadelphia, and San Francisco Departments. When their rates were compared to the general public, NIOSH found firefighters were 68 percent more likely to be diagnosed with some form of cancer.
Study Links Concussions to Increased Risk of Suicide, Dementia, Parkinson’s, and Psychiatric Disturbances
Each year, around 2.5 million Americans suffer from a concussion. Around 50,000 die from their injuries while the remaining victims suffer from a variety of symptoms for weeks, months, years, or possibly even longer. Most of those symptoms include temporary issues, such as difficulty concentrating, personality changes, confusion, balance problems, and headaches. However, a recent study has linked concussions to potentially lifelong and life-altering complications.
New, Lifelong Risks of a Concussion
Over the past few years, researchers, doctors, and scientists have more closely examined concussions and their propensity for long-term complications. Links to a variety of lifelong and life-altering issues have been uncovered in a number of studies, including an increased risk of Alzheimer’s, Parkinson’s, dementia, suicide, and other psychiatric disturbances. Some of the evidence is said to be merely circumstantial at this point, but most healthcare professionals now maintain that a head injury is more sinister than previously thought.
Study Finds Sexual Abusers of Teens in Juvenile Detention Rarely Disciplined
Young boys who are sentenced to a juvenile detention center are there to reform and learn that crime does not pay. But what happens when they are shown otherwise as they are sexually victimized, and the perpetrator remains unpunished and undisciplined? And why is it happening so often? A recent study from the Justice Department’s Bureau of Justice Statistics unveiled the alarming frequency but, unfortunately, we still do not have all the answers.
Sex Abuse Allegations in Detention Centers Have Doubled
According to various reports, the number of juveniles placed in detention centers has decreased. Yet, after analyzing data collected from the administrators of more than 1,400 state, local, and private juvenile detention centers, researchers determined that the rate of sex abuse allegations against guards and other staff members has doubled. In fact, the report indicated that, between 2007 and 2014, some 10 percent of children have reported sexual abuse while serving time.
Just One Percent of Doctors Linked to a Third of All Malpractice Claims
Statistics attribute anywhere from 65,000 to 200,000 deaths to medical accidents per year. Interestingly enough, a recently-published New England Journal of Medicine study suggests that many of those deaths might be the doing of just a small fraction of physicians. At the very least, the authors claimed to have linked one-third of all malpractice claims to just one percent of all doctors. This, paired with the set of distinctive characteristics outlined by the authors, could have a lot of people looking at their doctors very differently.
Bulk-Share of Paid Malpractice Claims Linked to Small Percentage of Doctors
Study authors examined more than 66,000 paid medical malpractice claims against 55,000 physicians between 2005 and 2014. Of those physicians, only six percent had a paid malpractice claim over the entire 10-year period. Only one percent of all physicians had more than one claim, and they ended up being responsible for about a third of all the filed malpractice claims during the study period. About a third of those claims resulted in patient death, and 54 percent caused serious injury.
