What are common injuries in a slip and fall accident?

Mayo Clinic reports that, over 10 million people a year suffer from slip and fall injuries. The National Safety Council suggests that falling accidents are one of the leading causes of unintentional injuries in the United States and considers falls as the number one danger for people over 65 years of age.

Many different factors cause accidental falls; the real danger lies in the severity of the injuries they cause.

Common types of painful and traumatic fall injuries include:

• Pulled muscles and stretched tendons. Reflexes like tensing your muscles and twisting your body in anticipation of a painful fall can result in the overextension of tendons or the painful stretching of muscles.
• Sprained and broken wrists and ankles. Your common impulse when you fall is to catch yourself. Unfortunately, attempting to stabilize yourself can cause you to twist your ankles, put too much pressure on your hands, or place too much weight onto delicate bones in the wrists and ankles, causing them to snap.
• Fractured clavicles. Falling forward can your chest into the ground. If your collarbone strikes the ground first, the impact force of the fall could cause your clavicle to shatter.
• Tailbone bruises or fractures. If you fall backward, the natural reaction is to extend your buttocks in order to absorb the impact on the softest part of your body. Unfortunately, the force of the fall could be so great that it travels through your tail bone, causing immense bruising and even breakage.
• Spinal cord injuries. Falling on your back could cause the majority of the force to be exerted on your spine. That much force could cause vertebrae to chip, nerves to become damaged, and even permanent destruction to your spinal cord itself.
• Head and brain injuries. Your skull is attached to your body by small bones, and when you fall on your back or your chest, your neck acts as a whip to your skull: the impact force travels up your neck and whips your skull back. This not only causes whiplash and neck injuries, but it could add additional force to your head as it strikes the ground. This force can cause skull fractures, bruising, and brain damage.