While the vast majority of dental treatments are carried out safely and with without a hitch, if the standard of care is violated, injury can occur. The consequences of an error during your treatment can, in the worst-case scenario, be a life-changing and permanent injury to your lingual nerve. If you believe your lingual nerve have been injured by your dentist, you need to talk to an expert legal representative who specializes in dental malpractice.
Anyone having a wisdom tooth extracted will understandably be concerned about the possible discomfort and the amount of time it will take to heal. No one relishes the thought of a tooth removed; it’s a procedure you may have to endure for the sake of your oral health. But if one side of your mouth or tongue feels numb since your extraction, something might have gone seriously wrong. And if you have lost your sense of taste on one half of your tongue since your last dental appointment, but the dentist is telling you weeks or even months later that it will get better in time, you need to call an attorney urgently. You may have a lingual nerve injury caused by negligent dental treatment.
In cases of dental malpractice, the extraction of lower wisdom teeth can result in injuries to the lingual nerve. Common symptoms of this are numbness in the left or the right side of the tongue and loss of taste on the left or the right side.
California law provides legal recourse if you have sustained injury due to dental malpractice, but there are limits. If your lingual nerve has been damaged, you can’t wait around forever.
That’s because filing a claim for malpractice is like missing a train: if you arrive at the station too late, it’s going to leave without you. In a case of lingual nerve damage caused during dental surgery, there is a statute of limitations set by California Code of Civil Procedure Section 340.5 for dental malpractice actions based on negligence. That means you’ve got one year to claim, starting from the time you discover your injury. After that time, it may to be impossible to file a winning claim. If you were injured by a dental extraction due to a dentist’s wrongful conduct months ago and you are only now considering a claim, the time to act is now.
There is a legal maxim that warns “the law serves the vigilant, not those who sleep upon their rights”. In other words, the law favors those who act swiftly and in a case of dental malpractice, you had better take action or miss your chance to make a claim.
In order to pursue a claim for dental malpractice resulting from lingual nerve damage by your dentist you need to get in touch with a specialist dental malpractice attorney. If you decide to contact Levy Law Firm, the simplest way to do this is by filling out the questionnaire form on our website. The more detail and documentation you can provide, the better. We don’t ask you for anything that isn’t pertinent to a successful claim, so please understand that every question is important. This will give our attorneys the necessary information required to make an initial determination.
If an attorney from our expert team believes we might be able to help you, we will get in touch and arrange an initial consultation, either via Zoom or in our offices.
At that meeting an attorney will go over all of the information you’ve provided via the questionnaire, which might include your dental records and photographs of your injury. You’ll need to share any original printed documentation with us so that it can be copied.
After such initial consultation, the attorney may need to consult with dental experts and will almost certainly need to request records from one or more care providers, including the dentist that injured you. Every case is different and so it might be a little while before enough evidence has been gathered for the firm to determine whether or not Levy Law Firm can represent you.
After this vitally important information gathering stage, we can meet with you again to discuss our legal opinion. Typically, we will explain what we think has happened to your lingual nerve anatomically, using a model of a jaw or some other illustration. Whenever possible, we want you to leave that meeting with a detailed understanding of your injury.
Working on a contingency basis means quite simply that we only get paid if your claim is successful. It’s sometimes described as “no win, no fee”. When your dental malpractice attorney works on contingency, the firm receives a percentage of your settlement or judgment if one is awarded, but you don’t have to pay a retainer or by the hour or any other legal fees.
No one can guarantee a successful outcome to your malpractice claim for lingual nerve injury, but when Levy Law Firm offers to represent you, we will work as hard as we can and you will not be charged a penny for our expertise.