Attorney Brian White Personal Injury Lawyers | March 19, 2025 | Personal Injury
Your nervous system controls your body. You can experience temporary or permanent paralysis when you suffer a brain or spinal cord injury. The location and extent of the paralysis often depend on the location and severity of your injury.
All cases of paralysis are serious. You may need physical therapy to try to regain some of your physical functions. Your injuries may also prevent you from supporting yourself financially. You may even need a caretaker to help you with your daily activities. As a result, you could incur significant financial expenses and suffer a diminishment of your quality of life.
Definition of Hemiplegia
You might be familiar with quadriplegia and paraplegia. Quadriplegia is paralysis that affects all four limbs, while paraplegia affects your legs. Hemiplegia is also a form of paralysis, but rather than affecting a certain level of your body, it affects one side of it. It results from damage to your central nervous system (CNS).
A related condition is hemiparesis. This condition also results from CNS damage. However, rather than causing paralysis, hemiparesis causes weakness on one side of your body.
In either case, you may have normal or nearly normal strength and movement on one side of your body. However, the other side may experience weakness, paralysis, or loss of sensation. Additional symptoms you might experience from hemiplegia or hemiparesis include seizures, speech impairment, and drooping facial muscles.
Causes of Hemiplegia
Your CNS includes your brain and spinal cord. The brain receives sensations and, in response, creates control signals. Your entire brain does not control your whole body. Instead, the right hemisphere of your brain controls the left side of your body, while the left hemisphere controls the right. This means damage to one hemisphere only affects one side of your body.
Thus, one cause of hemiplegia could be a brain injury that primarily or exclusively affects one side of your brain. Some common causes of traumatic brain injuries include motor vehicle accidents and falls.
For example, you could strike your head on the pavement during a motorcycle accident. The impact could cause your brain to shift inside your head. You could develop a subdural hematoma or cerebral contusion when your brain slams into the skull.
Importantly, this division between the left and right sides of your body persists through the spinal cord. The spinal cord includes 31 pairs of spinal nerves that connect your brain to your body below your neck. Each pair consists of one nerve for the right side of your body and one for the left. Damage to one nerve in a pair will produce symptoms on one side but not the other.
Thus, a spinal cord injury can also cause hemiplegia or hemiparesis. These injuries can happen when the spinal nerves are severed, compressed, or stretched. Damage to the nerves interferes with their ability to transmit nerve signals, resulting in the paralysis or weakness characteristic of these conditions.
Treatment for Hemiplegia
Some cases of hemiplegia are treatable, while others are not. Untreatable cases might involve severed nerves or extensive brain damage. However, in some cases, the brain can rewire itself to use new areas and nerves to regain some function. This characteristic, called neuroplasticity, may require extensive physical therapy so the brain can build and strengthen new connections.
Dealing With Hemiplegia
Hemiplegia can be a devastating condition. Paralysis on one side of your body may require lengthy and frequent physical therapy to try to regain function.
In many cases, you will never fully regain your physical abilities. As a result, you may need additional assistance with personal care. You may also need to seek compensation to meet your financial needs.
Contact a Houston Personal Injury Lawyer to Help You With Your Claim
For more information, contact the Houston personal injury law firm of Attorney Brian White Personal Injury Lawyers by calling (713) 500-5000.
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