Gair, Gair, Conason, Rubinowitz, Bloom, Hershenhorn, Steigman & Mackauf is a New York Plaintiff's personal injury law firm specializing in automobile accidents, construction accidents, medical malpractice, products liability, police misconduct and all types of New York personal injury litigation.

Articles Posted in Personal Injury

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NYC construction workers The number of construction accident fatalities in New York City recorded by the DOB doubled during the first seven months of 2018 compared to the same period of 2017. The DOB data does not include fatalities from transit and roadway projects, as well as health emergencies, that are not in DOB’s jurisdiction and usually approximately account for an additional third of the DOB numbers. These numbers are usually recorded by OSHA but are not available so far.

8 construction workers died between January 1st 2018 and July 31st 2018. The year before, 4 of them died during the same period of time. Injuries also rose by 17% from 401 to 469 while the total number of construction accidents went up 18.4% from 386 to 457.

Among the 8 workers who died, 4 of them died while working on a Manhattan construction site , 2 of them while working on a Queens site, one of them on a Brooklyn site and one of them on a Bronx site. Sadly most of these deaths might have been prevented if safety rules had been proprely implemented and respected.

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school sport can lead to injuriesOveruse Injuries often occur when young athletes are pushed by their parents, their teachers or their coach to be highly specialized in one sport at an early age. As kids get back to school, many of them will be lead to focus on one specific chosen sport only. Supported by their parents and their teachers, they will try to develop into great athletes. However a recent study in Pediatrics shows that athletes below the age of 18 who are highly specialized in one sport only have a much higher risk to develop overuse injuries and to ultimately quit sports.

Most elite athletes practiced several sports as kids before they specialized in one sport in late adolescence

Social pressure to develop kids into superstar athletes has led parents to believe that early sport specialization and more practice is beneficial for their children. While focusing intensely on one sport in an early age may give a temporary advantage to a child, it may sadly result in an increased risk for injury that ultimately may cause the child to miss time from playing or to quit. Additionally the idea that elite athletes started to specialize at a young age is a misconception. Studies show that most of them participated in multi sports in their early teens and only specialized in one sport in late adolescence.

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NYC personal injury lawyer Ben RubinowitzCongratulations to our managing partner, Ben Rubinowitz  for being recognized for obtaining one of the top 50 verdicts in the Country by The National Law Journal’s Elite Trial Lawyers for the period January 2017 through April 2018. The Verdict was also one of the top 5 in New York. Ben obtained a $71,000,000 Verdict in Wang v. Sexton in New York Supreme Court, New York County. The case was tried before Supreme Court Judge James d’Auguste. After 3 weeks of trial, the Manhattan Jury awarded Ms. Wang a stunning amount of money to fully and fairly compensate her for injuries suffered in a car accident in New York in August of 2012. This is one of the largest verdicts ever in the Country for a Spinal Injury case.  For details regarding the case see our prior Blog.

Elite Trial Lawyer Top 50 Verdicts highlights the largest verdicts from January 2017 through April 2018. The National Law Journal’s VerdictSearch affiliate scours the nation’s court records in search of the largest verdicts; it also consults with practitioners and with additional ALM Media LLC publications”.

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Best Lawyers Award BadgeOur NYC Personal Injury Law Firm is proud to announced that 9 of our attorneys made it to the to 2019 Best Lawyers® list. These lawyers are:

  • Marijo C. Adimey – Personal Injury Litigation – Plaintiffs
  • Jeffrey B. Bloom – Personal Injury Litigation – Plaintiffs, Legal Malpractice Law – Plaintiffs, Medical Malpractice Law – Plaintiffs, Professional Malpractice Law – Plaintiffs
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New York Personal Injury Peter SagirOur Partner, New York Personal Injury Attorney Peter J. Saghir, recently served as a faculty member of the Northeast Building Trial Skills program for the National Institute of Trial Advocacy at Hofstra University August 7 – 12.

Each year practicing attorneys participate in the program to develop and hone their trial skills. Peter was asked to critique and provide insight to the attorneys participating in the program.

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Our Medical Malpractice Attorneys Jeffrey Bloom and Ben Rubinowitz represented the family  of Joan Rivers after she died during a routine endoscopy at a Manhattan surgery center. Sadly many other patients have died following complications or surgical errors at this type of center as many States still do not have regulations that may prevent them. For example in most of the country there is no law that prohibits a doctor who was laid off by a hospital for misconduct to open a surgery center.

A recent USA TODAY NETWORK and Kaiser Health News investigation found that a surgery center in Arkansas 3 people died during colonoscopy procedures in 15 weeks and none of them were reported to an oversight authority. Patients coming for procedures were obviously not aware of these deaths either. This must change.

The lack of oversight continues to kill patients at surgery centers

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Opiod deaths in constructionConstruction workers have one of the highest risk of suffering from personal injury during their activity. According to the National Safety Council, more than 70,000 construction workers are injured every year in the US with back injuries and hand injuries being the most common. Nearly all construction workers will suffer at least one occupation related injury during their lifetime. Researchers also found that a construction worker that has a career longer than 45 years has a 75% risk of suffering a disabling injury.

Therefore it is not surprising that construction workers are being prescribed a lot of opioids to treat the pain caused by these injuries.

Usually workers receive compensation during the time that they are injured but it is often not enough to make up for lost pay. Therefore many injured construction workers are using opioids to get back to work faster.

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Our Partner, New York Personal Injury Lawyer Ben Rubinowitz, was asked to lecture and share his experience with Supreme Court Judges at the New York State Judicial Institute. Each year the Judicial Institute provides seminars for sitting Supreme Court Judges. This year Ben was asked to provide insight on Medical Malpractice cases and recent updates on central issues in the field. Joining Ben as a featured expert are the Hon. George Silver, Elizabeth Cornacchio , Charles Bach and Jeff Korek.

NYC Personal Injury Attorney Ben Rubinowitz at recent presentation

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Among all the States in the US, New York State has the highest rate of mothers injured while giving birth.  Many of these injuries are the direct result of hospital negligence and medical malpractice. A recent investigation by USA Today shows that not only in New York but all over America negligent medical workers skip basic safety practices that have proven to be life savers for mothers.

Weighing blood pads to track dangerous hemorrhages as well as controlling blood pressure and if necessary immediately providing medication to prevent strokes are basic procedures that protect a mother about to give birth. However in the US many nurses, doctors and hospitals continue to ignore them. As a result while in most developed countries the rate of maternal deaths and injuries dropped drastically over the last decades, it rose sharply in the US.

maternal deaths in developed countries
Excepted for California where safe practices have been implemented, hospitals in other Sates continue to ignore basic safety practices.  As a result, every day in the US, 2 mothers die from complications related to delivery. Many of them bleed to death because doctors and nurses don’t bother to quantify blood losses. Many others die from stroke because the hospital staff didn’t track their blood pressure or didn’t provide blood pressure medication on time. Most of these deaths are preventable. Experts estimate that 93% of the deaths related to bleeding could be avoided by quantifying blood loss and 60% of the deaths related to blood pressure disorder could be prevented simply by proprely monitoring blood pressure.

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LightningTwo men suffered personal injury in New York City after they got hit by a lightning strike. The two men were playing soccer in Flushing Meadows Park, near the Queens Zoo on Tuesday night.  The storm broke around 7:30 pm as the 30 and 42 year old men were playing a six-on-six pick-up soccer game.

Nearby the NYPD was holding an event at the park called “National Night Out” and as the storm arrived police were telling people attending the event to clear the area. Andrew Graneros an employee with Everything Entertainment which provided inflatable rides and tents for the event was taking down the rides with his coworker when lightning hit the soccer field. He heard the thunder and immediately looked at the field. The goalie and another player next to him were laying on the ground  He ran to the NYPD event to ask for help. There were a bunch of cops and ambulances around so the response was extremely fast.

The two victims were rushed to the hospital. So far,both victims survived. However the youngest one suffered life threatening injuries and he is still fighting to stay alive.