A report published in 2008 by the Royal College of Surgeons has gone almost unnoticed by those who deal with whiplash injury claims but could have a direct bearing on the level of injury suffered by those involved in low speed impacts. Whiplash is a common injury in road traffic accidents and accounts for three quarters of compensation claims every year as a result of collisions on the road. One of the most contentious areas of debate has been just how severe and long lasting the effects of whiplash injury can be, and the report throws new light on an area previously unexplored by both insurers and claims assessors.

The study looked at the degenerative effects of a whiplash injury on patients who already had suffered trauma to the neck or shoulders resulting from previous whiplash injuries. Up until recently it was believed that although whiplash can have a long term effect of up to a year once the initial recovery time has passed, the neck and shoulders should by then be fully recovered and that secondary injuries would not be influenced or compounded by the earlier tissue damage.

The report suggests that this assumption is wrong and that claims experts and the medical profession have been underestimating the compound effect of secondary whiplash injuries.
The study looked at over 100 cases of patients who had been involved in two incidences where whiplash had been the resulting injury. Of the 92% of patients asked who had suffered a low or medium grade second injury, 87% felt that they had suffered lesser symptoms in the first injury and that the second injury, although graded as the same level of impact as the first, had caused them greater discomfort or pain.

There is controversy surrounding the suggestion that there is a cumulative and degenerative effect from whiplash injury. A previous study concluded that over 80% of patients complained of worse symptoms after their second injury, despite that injury occurring an average of 6 years after the first injury. There are obviously a number of ways that the studies could be considered to be bias; principally the severity of the primary and secondary incidences being dissimilar and the patient’s interpretation or memory of the first accident and the severity of the injuries suffered.

But it is, however, something that warrants further research and the RCS study concludes that subjects underestimate the severity of the earlier injury or it may be in fact that there is a cumulative, long term effect with whiplash injuries, no matter how well the patient feels that they have recovered.

Continuing research has shown that whiplash injuries can cause long term effects but because the study of this particular injury is still relatively new there is no way to collate sufficient evidence to show the full range of any cumulative effects for certain. It could easily complicate an already murky area of claims assessment and throw into question medical evidence brought in whiplash compensation injury cases as to the exact nature of the effects, particularly if the victim has suffered a previous injury.

At the moment, the jury is still out on this contentious issue but further research and clearer guidelines are essential if victims of whiplash injury are to receive the compensation that their injuries warrant. The clarity that previous research has brought to the issue may just have become a little more clouded.