Houston Broken Bone Injury Lawyer
A broken bone is rarely just a fracture. Depending on where it happens in your body and how the break occurs, you may be looking at surgery, hardware implants, months of physical therapy, and a recovery timeline that derails your work, your income, and your daily life in ways that are hard to anticipate from the emergency room. When someone else’s negligence caused that injury, whether through a car crash, a fall at a business, a workplace accident, or any other situation where another party failed to act reasonably, you have the right to pursue compensation that actually reflects what you have been through and what still lies ahead. A Houston broken bone injury lawyer at the Law Office of Shane R. Kadlec can help you understand what your claim is worth and what it takes to recover it.
Fracture cases get undervalued constantly. Insurance companies know that broken bones sound straightforward, so they push fast settlements before the full scope of the injury becomes clear. What looks like a simple break in week one can turn into a complication requiring additional surgery by week eight. Nerve damage, compartment syndrome, improper healing, and post-traumatic arthritis are all real possibilities that belong in any serious damages calculation. Accepting a quick payout before you know your full prognosis is one of the most common mistakes fracture victims make.
Houston’s roads, construction sites, and commercial properties generate fracture injuries at a significant rate. The Houston metro area’s sheer traffic volume on corridors like I-10, the 610 Loop, US-59, and Beltway 8 means high-speed collisions happen daily, and fractures are among the most common serious injuries those crashes produce. Beyond car accidents, the region’s petrochemical and construction industries create hazardous conditions that break bones in workers and bystanders alike. Whatever the setting, the legal analysis starts in the same place: who was responsible for the conditions that caused this injury, and what are they obligated to compensate you for?
Types of Broken Bone Injuries Our Firm Handles
- Femur and hip fractures: These are among the most serious orthopedic injuries a person can sustain. Femur breaks often require surgical rod placement, and hip fractures, particularly in older adults, carry significant risks during recovery. They arise frequently from T-bone collisions, pedestrian accidents, and falls on poorly maintained property.
- Vertebral compression fractures: High-impact rear-end collisions and rollover crashes can compress or shatter vertebrae, sometimes causing spinal cord involvement. Even fractures without neurological damage require extensive treatment and carry long-term pain consequences that must be documented carefully for a full recovery claim.
- Wrist and forearm fractures: Common in both falls and vehicle collisions when victims brace for impact. Distal radius fractures and both-bone forearm breaks can affect grip strength, range of motion, and the ability to perform job functions permanently.
- Rib fractures: Multiple rib fractures from blunt force, common in car accidents and heavy equipment incidents, can cause pneumothorax, restrict breathing, and keep victims hospitalized for extended periods. They are often underestimated in early insurance negotiations.
- Orbital and facial fractures: Airbag deployments, side-impact crashes, and slip-and-fall incidents can fracture cheekbones, eye sockets, and nasal bones. These injuries involve plastic surgery and carry disfigurement considerations that add to the damages picture.
- Ankle and lower leg fractures: Particularly common in premises liability cases involving uneven flooring, missing handrails, and wet surfaces. A displaced ankle fracture often requires ORIF surgery and can result in chronic instability affecting a person’s ability to walk, stand, or work on their feet.
- Compound and open fractures: When a broken bone pierces the skin, infection risk, additional surgical procedures, and longer hospitalization become immediate concerns. These fractures most commonly arise from severe traffic collisions and falls from significant heights, both of which occur regularly across Houston’s industrial and construction sectors.
What Shane Kadlec Brings to a Fracture Injury Case
Board certification in personal injury trial law from the Texas Board of Legal Specialization is not a credential that comes easily. Attorney Shane R. Kadlec earned that certification in 2003 and has maintained it through rigorous re-certification reviews. The Texas Board of Legal Specialization certifies only attorneys who have dedicated a substantial portion of their practice to personal injury litigation, demonstrated meaningful trial experience, passed comprehensive written testing, and been reviewed by their professional peers. Only around 10 percent of Texas attorneys pursue this level of credentialing, and the distinction matters because a broken bone injury claim can go to trial. When a defendant’s insurance company understands that the attorney across the table has genuine courtroom experience, it changes how they evaluate a claim.
The firm’s case results speak directly to what that experience produces in practice. A rear-end collision case resulted in a settlement exceeding $900,000 for a client who suffered head, knee, and back injuries. A side-swipe crash produced a six-figure settlement for a client who required multiple injection procedures. These outcomes reflect the kind of claim-building that accounts for all compensable damages, not just the initial medical bills. For fracture injury clients specifically, that means calculating surgery costs, hardware removal procedures if needed, physical therapy over a realistic recovery horizon, future treatment for complications, lost wages during recovery, and reduced earning capacity if the injury limits what work the client can physically do going forward. Pain and suffering, which Texas law fully recognizes as compensable, is calculated with the same seriousness as the economic losses.
The firm serves injury victims across Houston and all of Harris County on a contingency fee basis, which means no legal fees unless the case is resolved successfully. For anyone already facing medical bills and lost income from a fracture injury, that structure matters practically. It also means the firm’s interests are directly aligned with getting the best possible result for you, not just moving a case through the system quickly.
After a Fracture Injury: What to Do and What to Avoid
Medical care comes first, and that is not just advice for your health. The documentation your treatment generates forms the factual spine of any personal injury claim. Every imaging study, every surgical note, every physical therapy record is evidence of what the injury actually required. Missing follow-up appointments or stopping treatment prematurely because you feel somewhat better can give the opposing insurance company grounds to argue that your injuries were not as serious as claimed, or that your own actions interrupted your recovery. Continue the treatment your doctors recommend and keep every appointment.
Gather documentation while the accident circumstances are fresh. If your fracture resulted from a vehicle crash, the Harris County Sheriff’s Office or Houston Police Department will have created a crash report. You can obtain that report through the Texas Department of Transportation’s Crash Report Online Purchase System. If it happened at a business or commercial property, request that the property owner or manager preserve any surveillance footage immediately. Footage is typically overwritten on short cycles, sometimes within 24 to 72 hours, and once it is gone, it is gone. A lawyer can send a formal preservation letter quickly to put the property owner on notice that the footage must be retained.
Texas has a statute of limitations on personal injury claims, meaning there is a deadline to file suit. Missing that deadline typically results in losing your right to recover anything, regardless of how strong your case is. Do not assume you have unlimited time to decide. Consulting with a Houston broken bone attorney early does not commit you to anything, but it protects your ability to act when you are ready.
One thing to be particularly careful about: recorded statements to the opposing party’s insurance company. Adjusters are trained to ask questions in ways that can be used to minimize your claim later. You are not required to give a recorded statement to someone else’s insurer, and doing so before you have legal guidance is almost always a mistake in a serious injury case. Let an attorney handle that communication instead.
If your fracture stemmed from a workplace accident, the reporting pathway is different and involves Texas workers’ compensation rules alongside potential third-party claims. Many Houston employers in construction and industrial sectors are non-subscribers to the state workers’ comp system, which actually opens direct negligence claims against the employer under Texas law. The intersection of employer liability and third-party claims from equipment manufacturers or contractors is worth exploring with a personal injury attorney who understands how those claims interact.
What Texas Law Allows You to Recover
In a Texas personal injury case, the goal is to make the injured person whole, financially speaking, for everything the negligent party’s conduct caused. For broken bone injuries, that means the law allows recovery of past and future medical expenses, past and future lost earnings and earning capacity, physical pain and mental anguish, physical impairment, disfigurement if applicable, and the costs of any in-home care or assistance the injury requires.
Texas follows a modified comparative fault rule. You can recover damages even if you were partially at fault for the accident, as long as your share of fault is not greater than 50 percent. If you are found to be 20 percent at fault, for example, your recovery is reduced by 20 percent. This matters in fracture cases because defendants and their insurers will often try to assign some fault to the injured person. How that argument is handled, and how liability is documented from the beginning, affects the final outcome significantly.
The strength of a fracture injury claim also depends heavily on expert medical testimony. A treating orthopedic surgeon’s opinion on prognosis, future surgical needs, and functional limitations carries real weight in evaluating and resolving a claim. Working with a Houston injury attorney who understands how to build that medical narrative into a coherent damages picture is what separates a fair recovery from an inadequate one.
Questions People Ask About Broken Bone Injury Claims in Texas
How long does a broken bone injury claim typically take to resolve?
It depends on the severity of the fracture and how quickly your medical situation stabilizes. Claims are generally not pursued to settlement or trial until the injured person has reached what is called maximum medical improvement, meaning the medical picture is clear enough to calculate all past and future damages accurately. A relatively uncomplicated fracture might reach that point in several months. Cases involving multiple surgeries, hardware complications, or permanent impairment can take longer to fully develop.
Is a broken bone considered a serious injury for purposes of a personal injury claim?
Yes, fractures are recognized as significant injuries in Texas personal injury cases. The degree of seriousness varies by the type of break, whether surgery was required, how long recovery took, and whether there are any permanent effects. Compound fractures, femur breaks, vertebral fractures, and injuries requiring repeated surgeries all tend to support larger damage claims than simple non-displaced fractures that heal without complication.
What if the insurance company claims my fracture was a pre-existing condition?
Insurance companies raise this argument frequently, particularly when imaging shows prior degeneration or old healed fractures. Under Texas law, you can still recover for an injury that aggravated, accelerated, or worsened a pre-existing condition. The question is not whether the bone was perfect before the accident; the question is what the accident caused or made worse. Medical records and expert testimony are used to separate the pre-existing baseline from what the incident caused.
Who pays my medical bills while the case is still pending?
Your own health insurance, Personal Injury Protection coverage if your auto policy includes it, or MedPay coverage may be available to pay treating providers during the claim. Some treating physicians in Texas will also see fracture injury patients under a letter of protection, agreeing to be paid from the eventual settlement rather than upfront. Your attorney can help coordinate which payment sources apply and how they interact with your ultimate recovery.
Can I still file a claim if the accident was partly my fault?
Texas’s comparative fault framework allows recovery as long as your percentage of fault does not exceed 50 percent. If it does, you are barred from recovering. If it is below 50 percent, your damages are reduced proportionally. How fault is allocated in a case is often a central dispute, and having documentation that establishes the other party’s negligence clearly from the start puts you in a better position on that argument.
What if the person who caused my fracture did not have enough insurance to cover my damages?
This is a real problem in Texas, where minimum liability limits are low relative to what serious fracture injuries cost. Uninsured and underinsured motorist coverage on your own auto policy can bridge that gap in vehicle accident cases. In premises liability and workplace situations, the analysis is different and depends on the nature of the defendant’s coverage and assets. This is exactly the kind of coverage and recovery analysis that belongs in an early legal consultation.
Are damages available for a fracture injury that required no surgery?
Yes. Surgery is not a threshold requirement for recovery. A fracture that healed with immobilization, a cast, and physical therapy still caused real pain, required real medical treatment, and may have kept you out of work for weeks. All of that is compensable. The absence of surgery typically affects the overall damages calculation rather than the right to recover.
How does a lawyer prove that the fracture was caused by the defendant’s negligence?
Causation is established through a combination of the accident reconstruction or incident documentation, the timing of when the fracture was diagnosed relative to the incident, and medical expert opinions linking the mechanism of the accident to the specific injury. In vehicle crashes, crash data, scene photographs, and police reports contribute to that analysis. In premises cases, inspection records, prior complaint history, and building code compliance are examined.
What happens if I was hurt in an accident involving a commercial vehicle or truck?
Commercial vehicle accidents, including 18-wheeler crashes common on Houston’s freight corridors, often involve multiple liable parties. The driver, the trucking company, the cargo loader, and the vehicle maintenance contractor may each bear some responsibility. Federal trucking regulations impose additional duties on commercial carriers that do not apply to private drivers, and driver logs, inspection records, and company safety histories become part of the discovery process. These cases often involve larger insurers and more aggressive defense, which is exactly why having a board-certified personal injury attorney matters.
What if my fracture was caused by a fall at a store or other business in Houston?
Premises liability law requires business owners to maintain their property in a reasonably safe condition for customers. If a wet floor, broken flooring, inadequate lighting, or a missing handrail caused your fall, the business owner may be liable for your fracture. The key issues are whether they knew or should have known about the hazard and whether they failed to fix it or warn you. Surveillance footage, incident reports, and the property’s maintenance records are critical evidence in these cases, which is why moving quickly to preserve that evidence matters.
Broken Bone Injury Representation Across Houston and Harris County
The Law Office of Shane R. Kadlec represents fracture injury clients throughout the Houston metropolitan area and across all of Harris County. That includes clients from Midtown, Montrose, Heights, Third Ward, East End, and Greenway Plaza within the city, as well as residents of the Galleria area, Memorial, Spring Branch, Meyerland, and Gulfton neighborhoods. The firm also handles cases for injury victims in Pasadena, Baytown, Deer Park, La Marque, and the communities along the Ship Channel corridor where industrial activity concentrates workplace hazard risks. Clients from Katy, Sugar Land, Missouri City, Pearland, and Friendswood along the southwestern edges of the metro are served as well. The firm’s reach extends to Humble, Kingwood, Atascocita, Conroe, and The Woodlands to the north, where growth and heavy traffic on FM 1960 and the Grand Parkway corridors generate accident claims regularly. Whether the fracture occurred on the freeway, at a commercial property in Clear Lake or Stafford, or on a job site in Channelview or Alvin, the firm’s representation is available throughout the region without requiring clients to travel.
Talk to a Houston Broken Bone Attorney About Your Case
Recovering from a serious fracture is demanding enough without the added pressure of navigating an insurance claim on your own. A Houston broken bone attorney at the Law Office of Shane R. Kadlec will evaluate your case without charge, explain what your claim may be worth based on the actual facts, and handle the legal process from that point forward on a contingency fee basis. Attorney Shane Kadlec’s board certification in personal injury trial law from the Texas Board of Legal Specialization reflects a level of commitment to this practice area that shows in how claims are prepared and how they resolve. Call today to schedule your free consultation and get a clear picture of where your case stands and what comes next.