Postal Workers Suffer Serious Injuries from Slip & Fall Accidents in RI & Mass

The most common reason for emergency room visits? Slip and fall accidents. Over a million visitors frequent the ER each year as a result of a slip, trip, or fall. The Providence personal injury lawyers at Tapalian Law know just how serious a personal injury that results from a slip and fall accident can be. Winter snow and ice make for more frequent, and dangerous, slip and fall injuries specifically to us in the Rhode Island and Massachusetts area. But not everyone can stay inside and cozy up in a snowstorm. A number of occupations must continue to work despite poor weather including police officers, firefighters, and medical personnel. We also count on postal workers for important home and business mail and package deliveries. Postal employees who deliver mail are particularly vulnerable to the threat of slip and fall accidents caused by snow and icy conditions. If you have been injured at work or at home in a slip, trip, or fall in Rhode Island or Massachusetts, contact Providence personal injury attorney David Tapalian to see if you are eligible to seek compensation for your injuries. Visit our Rhode Island Accident Lawyer Blog for ways to prevent slip and fall incidents and steps to take after a slip and fall accident.

USPS Asks Customers for Help to Prevent Slip & Fall Injuries

Due to an abundance of postal delivery employees who suffer from slip and fall accidents each winter, the United States Postal Service (USPS) is asking customers for help during the wintry weather. The USPS asks customers in Rhode Island, Massachusetts, and other areas hit hard by winter conditions to keep walkways, sidewalks, and areas around mailboxes clear of snow and ice to help prevent a fall. Customers are requested to shovel, sand, and ice their walkways, sidewalks, and surrounding mailbox area, as necessary to assist deliveries made on foot. If your mail is delivered by a mail truck, customers are asked to clear enough snow from around the mailbox to allow the mail truck safe delivery access. Postal delivery employees don’t want to inconvenience customers by skipping a delivery, however if conditions are not clear or safe to deliver on foot or by mail truck, the workers are instructed to skip the delivery and hold onto the mail or packages until safety conditions improve.

How Dangerous Are Slip & Fall Accidents?

Injuries as a result of a slip, trip, or fall, can be relatively minor or extremely severe. The injuries can also result in a fatality. As personal injury lawyers, our Providence and Seekonk slip and fall lawyers have seen slip and fall accidents result in all of the above. Slips, trips, and falls are especially detrimental to the elderly and can frequently be life-threatening. Common injuries that occur from a slip or fall are broken bones, fractures, sprains, and torn ligaments. These types of injuries can range from minor to serious. Frequent results of a fall also are head, back, neck, and shoulder injuries, brain injury, concussions, and spinal cord injuries. Falls make up 87% of fractures seen among the elderly and are the second leading cause of spinal cord and brain injury.

Do I Have a Valid Slip & Fall Claim?

After your Rhode Island or Massachusetts slip and fall accident, or any type of injury, the most important action to take is to seek immediate medical treatment. Seek the advice of an experienced slip and fall accident attorney at Tapalian Law who specializes in Rhode Island and Massachusetts personal injury law. To determine if you have a valid premises liability claim, your Rhode Island slip and fall lawyer will look to answer some important questions. For example, if you fell on an icy walkway leading into a drugstore in Providence, questions may include:

• Did the owner of the property where you fell have a “duty of care” to protect those people coming onto the property? A property owner, residential or commercial, must use a degree of caution and concern that a prudent and rational person would use under similar circumstances. After a snowstorm, a property owner is expected, and has a duty of care to, keep the walkways maintained and free of snow and ice for customers.
• Did the owner breach the duty of care? Did the drugstore property owner fail to shovel snow and ice and use salt or sand thereby creating a potentially slippery situation where a customer could slip?
• Did the breach cause injury or harm? Did you slip and fall on the slippery walkway resulting in a broken arm?
• Did you suffer damages due to the accident? Damages may be economic (monetary) such as hospital bills, physical therapy expenses, lost wages, etc. or non-economic (non-monetary) such as pain and suffering or a reduced quality of life as a result of the injury.

Contact an Experienced Rhode Island Personal Injury Lawyer After Your Slip & Fall Accident

At Tapalian Law, our Rhode Island and Massachusetts injury attorneys specialize in helping victims suffering from all types of personal injury caused by slip and falls, car accidents, motorcycle crashes, truck accidents, and pedestrian accidents, or any other type of injury caused by the negligence of another person. Our slip and fall lawyers have helped personal injury victims in cities like Providence, Pawtucket, East Providence, Warwick, Cranston, as well as Seekonk, Taunton, Fall River, and New Bedford. If you are suffering due to an accident that took place in Rhode Island or Massachusetts, don’t hesitate to contact our personal injury law firm with locations in Providence and Seekonk, at 401-552-5000, or reach out to us online.