Seat Belt Injuries

Seat belts are designed to prevent injuries during car crashes by reducing the ability of a person to make contact with the hard surfaces within the car. They are also designed to hold a person within a car rather than allowing him or her to be thrown from the car and injured further. While seatbelts provide a necessary service, they too are capable of hurting people. In most cases, the injury caused by the seat belt is less than that if there had not been a seatbelt, but there are exceptions to the rule.

The current seatbelt design is called the three-point belt. This design is meant to spread the force of stopping the person over a wider portion of the body, rather than focusing the force on one spot like the older belts, like lap-belts. In older belts that stopped only one area, all of the forward momentum of the body was stopped by a thin belt in one spot. In lap belts, this focus was on the pelvis. While this set of bones is tough, it was sometimes unable to take the huge force and could be broken or shattered.

Three-point belts, on the other hand, spread the force across the torso and anchor the pelvis as well. This reduces the force on one area of the body. Unfortunately, these belts slip sometimes. If the lap belt slides up over the abdomen, it can result in abdominal tenderness or bowel injuries in an accident. The shoulder strap can injure the neck if it is in the wrong place at the time of the accident.

To reduce the potential for injuries, seat belts should be worn as tightly as possible. This eliminates much of the body’s ability to move forward and then get caught by the seatbelt.

Contact a Jacksonville Seatbelt Injury Attorney

If you have been injured by your seatbelt in a car crash, contact the Jacksonville seatbelt injury attorneys of the Law Offices of Donald Guthrie at 904-296-1088.