Road traffic accidents are sadly on the increase and as a result more and more people are now suffering injury; however some of these injuries are not actually caused by the road traffic accident but they can be caused by wearing a seatbelt; meaning many drivers and passengers who are involved in road traffic accidents are now suffering as a result of the one thing that is meant to protect them within a car.

Since 1983 you are permitted by law to have to wear a seatbelt within a car. Your seatbelt is your safety harness while you are travelling within a car; it is designed to secure you against harmful movement that can occur as a result of a collision or a sudden stop. They are intended to reduce injury by stopping you from hitting hard interiors of the vehicle and by preventing passengers from being thrown from the vehicle.

Seatbelts have gone through various changes since there introduction. They used to exist in various different forms such as a lap design, which is an adjustable strap that goes over your waist. This design was used a lot in older cars; however they are now uncommon expect when they are used in the rear of a car for the middle seat. Another design that passed through the ages was the sash design, which is an adjustable strap that goes over the shoulder. This design was mainly used in the 1960’s; however it was soon discovered that they were of limited benefit as it is easy to slip out of this design when involved in a collision.

The seatbelts that we now find present in our cars are known as three point seatbelts. These seatbelts are a lot similar to the lap and shoulder ones for the fact that they are like the two of them combined. These three point seatbelts help to spread out the energy of the moving body in a collision over the chest, pelvis and shoulders. Until the 1980s three-point belts were commonly available only in the front seats of cars with the back seats only having lap seatbelts but due to evidence emerging showing the potential for lap belts to cause the separation of the lumbar vertebrae and the sometimes associated paralysis, or seat belt syndrome, has led to a revision of passenger safety regulations in nearly all of the developed world requiring that all seats in a vehicle be equipped with three-point belts.

If you are involved in a road traffic accident there is the potential risk of your seatbelt digging into your abdomen and if this happens you could have an increase in abdominal tenderness as well as bowel injuries.

In order to reduce your risk of suffering from a seat belt related injury you should wear your seatbelt as tight as possible and you should wear the lap aspect of the seatbelt over your pelvis and hips, not your stomach as well as you should wear the diagonal aspect of your seatbelt over your shoulders and not your neck.

If you have been involved in a road traffic accident that was caused through no fault of your own and you have suffered from a seatbelt injury as a result of it then you could be entitled to make a claim for compensation.

If you are hoping to pursue a claim for compensation it is important that you get in touch with a legal firm today who will be able to guide you through everything that you need to know about making a claim for compensation.

Helen is the web master of Accident Consult, specialists in all aspects of Seatbelt Injury Compensation claims.