I was in a bike accident about 2 weeks ago. A little girl (my unreliable estimate is 11 at the oldest) ran in front of me without looking and there was zero time to react so I hit her and went down. Girl was fine but I had to take myself to the ER.
I have reasonably good insurance so the ER visit and subsequent stitch removal/broken hand treatment are probably not going to be very expensive...but I also hit my teeth and was referred to a dentist. The first visit was only $250 which might get covered by my health insurance (since it was related to the accident and I was instructed to go to a dentist by the doctor) and if not, a % of it can get covered by my dental insurance. My teeth were structurally sound but now one is turning gray and I am pretty sure they will tell me that I need a root canal at my followup visit this week....root canals sound expensive.
If the bills start to add up...I feel like I need to talk to the girl's parents. She was at fault for sure--she was aware of this and apologizing profusely and the random jogger who stopped to help after he saw it happen knew this as well--but her parents were not there. I have the phone number of a woman who was either the mother/nanny of another child she was out with who could presumably put me in contact with the girl and her parents.
The nurse wanted to file a police report in the hospital but the chicago police basically said "we have better things to do than to send someone out for a bike accident...come by the station if you really want to file" and while the girl was at fault, its not like it was intentional--so I just left it alone.
If the bills come and seem like too much, what do I do? Obviously, I've already had to take time off work and had a bunch of plans ruined by being in a cast...and now I have an ugly tooth (the top front one...right in the middle of my smile) that will probably need a root canal and maybe extra work to get it to a color that matches the rest of my teeth...I feel bad asking the parents to pay for anything but its not really my fault that their little girl was negligent and might leave me stuck with some big bills.
I have reasonably good insurance so the ER visit and subsequent stitch removal/broken hand treatment are probably not going to be very expensive...but I also hit my teeth and was referred to a dentist. The first visit was only $250 which might get covered by my health insurance (since it was related to the accident and I was instructed to go to a dentist by the doctor) and if not, a % of it can get covered by my dental insurance. My teeth were structurally sound but now one is turning gray and I am pretty sure they will tell me that I need a root canal at my followup visit this week....root canals sound expensive.
If the bills start to add up...I feel like I need to talk to the girl's parents. She was at fault for sure--she was aware of this and apologizing profusely and the random jogger who stopped to help after he saw it happen knew this as well--but her parents were not there. I have the phone number of a woman who was either the mother/nanny of another child she was out with who could presumably put me in contact with the girl and her parents.
The nurse wanted to file a police report in the hospital but the chicago police basically said "we have better things to do than to send someone out for a bike accident...come by the station if you really want to file" and while the girl was at fault, its not like it was intentional--so I just left it alone.
If the bills come and seem like too much, what do I do? Obviously, I've already had to take time off work and had a bunch of plans ruined by being in a cast...and now I have an ugly tooth (the top front one...right in the middle of my smile) that will probably need a root canal and maybe extra work to get it to a color that matches the rest of my teeth...I feel bad asking the parents to pay for anything but its not really my fault that their little girl was negligent and might leave me stuck with some big bills.
