Meridian Head & Brain Injury Lawyer
A blow to the head on a Lauderdale County job site can look minor in the first hour and turn into months of headaches, memory gaps, and trouble holding a job. Lunsford, Baskin & Priebe PLLC is a workers’ compensation law firm that represents injured workers across Mississippi and Louisiana, including Meridian and the communities around it, and a Meridian head and brain injury lawyer from our team handles the claims that insurers are most likely to dispute.
Head and brain injuries are different from a broken bone or a torn shoulder because the proof is harder to see. A concussion may never show on a standard CT scan. The worker may look fine at the safety meeting, then struggle with light, noise, balance, and concentration for weeks. Adjusters know this, and they often argue that the symptoms are stress, age, or something unrelated to the accident. Building the claim means getting the right specialists, the right testing, and the right witnesses on record before the insurer defines the injury for you.
The stakes extend well beyond one paycheck. A brain injury can end a career in a trade that depends on balance, focus, and quick reactions, and it can change how a person works, drives, and handles daily life. Mississippi workers’ compensation is built to cover medical care and a portion of lost wages, but those benefits only flow when the injury is accepted, documented, and tied to the job. Getting that foundation right early shapes everything that follows.
Why Choose Lunsford, Baskin & Priebe for a Brain Injury Claim at Work
Lunsford, Baskin & Priebe PLLC represents injured workers throughout Mississippi and Louisiana, serving Meridian and the surrounding region, Jackson, Madison, Hattiesburg, the Gulf Coast, the Delta, and communities across south Louisiana. Our attorneys bring over 75 years of combined experience, and the firm has recovered more than $100 million in settlements for clients. Consultations are free, we advance the costs of the case, and we are paid only if we recover benefits or a settlement for you. Our phones are answered 24 hours a day, and we speak Spanish with clients from the first call to the end of the case.
Our results show how seriously we treat injuries that insurers want to minimize. The firm obtained a $685,000 settlement for a surgical tech with a lower back injury, $600,000 for a construction worker with a complex back injury, and $385,000 for a project manager injured when his work vehicle was struck. We also secured $221,000 for a land-based oil rig worker with severe burns. Those cases involved the same pressure a head injury claim brings: an insurer questioning causation and a worker needing medical care while income stops.
Rob Lunsford, our Founding Partner, has spent his entire legal career representing injured workers. Brad Baskin and Jennifer Priebe, both Partners, have been recognized by Best Lawyers, Super Lawyers, and The National Trial Lawyers, and the firm was ranked by Best Law Firms in 2026 for Workers’ Compensation Law, Claimants, in Jackson. Andrew Rueff has successfully tried dozens of jury and bench trials to verdict and regularly appears before the Mississippi Workers’ Compensation Commission. Keaton Belk and Erin Heimlicher round out the attorneys who work these claims. Clients describe a team that listens, communicates clearly, and fights the insurance company at every step.
Types of Head and Brain Injury Claims We Handle
- Concussions and Mild Traumatic Brain Injury: Often caused by a fall from a ladder or scaffold, a struck-by incident, or a vehicle collision. These injuries can leave persistent headaches, dizziness, light sensitivity, and cognitive fog while imaging looks normal, which is exactly why insurers resist them.
- Moderate and Severe Traumatic Brain Injury: Falls from height, crush incidents, and heavy equipment accidents on construction sites, in plants, and around the timber and manufacturing operations common in east Mississippi. These cases can involve hospitalization, surgery, rehabilitation, and permanent limits on work.
- Driving and Trucking Accidents: Delivery drivers, truck drivers, and workers traveling between sites along the interstates and highways through Meridian can suffer head trauma in wrecks while on the clock. These cases may support both a comp claim and a separate claim against the at-fault driver.
- Post-Concussion Syndrome: Symptoms that continue for months, including memory problems, mood changes, sleep disruption, and trouble concentrating. Insurers frequently try to end benefits once the initial injury appears to have healed.
- Skull Fractures and Facial Trauma: Impact injuries from falling objects, tool strikes, and machinery that fracture bone and may also damage the brain underneath. These often require specialists and staged treatment.
- Burns, Explosions, and Industrial Incidents: Plant and oilfield events can cause head trauma alongside burns and other catastrophic injuries, which raises both the medical needs and the long-term disability picture.
- Cognitive and Behavioral Changes After Injury: Problems with memory, judgment, temper, and processing speed that coworkers and family often notice before the worker does. Their accounts can be important evidence.
- Vision, Balance, and Hearing Problems: Injuries to the head can disrupt the vestibular system and the senses, making a return to ladders, driving, or equipment operation unsafe even when the worker feels willing to go back.
What to Do After a Head Injury at Work in Mississippi
Get medical attention the same day, even if you feel mostly fine, and tell the provider exactly how the injury happened and that it happened at work. Head injuries can worsen over hours or days, and a gap between the accident and the first treatment gives an insurer room to argue the symptoms came from somewhere else. Describe every symptom, including the ones that seem small, such as nausea, ringing in the ears, trouble finding words, or sensitivity to light. If you were knocked out or dazed, say so, even if it lasted only a moment.
Report the injury to your employer in writing as soon as you can. In both Mississippi and Louisiana the outer limit for notice is 30 days from the accident, and waiting invites a fight over whether the employer was told. Keep a copy of what you send. In Mississippi, a worker generally has two years from the date of injury or the last compensation payment to file a Petition to Controvert with the Mississippi Workers’ Compensation Commission, so a claim that looks settled informally should not be left unfiled indefinitely. In Louisiana, a formal claim generally must be filed within one year of the accident, though payments already made can extend that window to three years from the last payment. Exceptions are narrow, so a call to an attorney early is far safer than guessing.
Write down the names of anyone who saw the accident or noticed you acting differently afterward. Brain injury claims often turn on lay witnesses, because coworkers, supervisors, and family members can describe confusion, irritability, or memory lapses that a short doctor’s visit may not capture. Keep a simple daily record of symptoms, missed work, and tasks you can no longer do. Follow every treatment instruction and attend every appointment, since gaps in care are one of the first things an insurer points to.
Be careful with the insurance adjuster. A recorded statement given while you are still foggy or in pain can be quoted back months later. Do not agree to return to full duty before your treating doctor clears you, and do not accept a doctor chosen by the carrier as the final word on your condition. In Mississippi, your case is heard by an Administrative Judge at the Mississippi Workers’ Compensation Commission, and the Full Commission sits in Jackson to review the record when a decision is appealed. That review is not a new trial, which is why the medical evidence and testimony gathered at the first hearing matter so much.
How Insurers Contest Brain Injury Claims, and How the Evidence Answers
The most common attack is that nothing shows up on the scan. Many concussions and diffuse injuries do not appear on a routine CT or MRI, and a normal image does not mean a normal brain. Neurologists, neuropsychologists, and specialists in vestibular and vision disorders can document deficits through cognitive testing and clinical examination. A claim supported by that kind of testing, plus consistent treatment records, is much harder to wave away.
The second common attack is pre-existing conditions. Insurers point to old injuries, migraines, depression, or age-related changes and argue the job did not cause the problem. A pre-existing condition does not automatically end a claim; if the work incident caused, worsened, or accelerated the condition, benefits may still be owed. Answering this argument takes medical opinions that clearly connect the accident to the change in the worker’s function.
Wage benefits are the other pressure point. Mississippi pays temporary and permanent total disability at two-thirds of the worker’s average weekly wage, subject to a statutory weekly maximum, and generally not beyond 450 weeks. Permanent partial disability in non-scheduled cases is also capped at 450 weeks. A brain injury that leaves a worker able to do some tasks but not their old job raises hard questions about loss of earning capacity, and those questions are better addressed with vocational evidence than with an adjuster’s assumptions. In Louisiana, supplemental earnings benefits can apply when a worker returns at reduced pay, and the statutory framework runs up to 520 weeks with temporary total benefits counting toward that period.
When the injury came from someone other than your employer, such as a negligent driver or an unsafe contractor, a separate injury claim may exist alongside the comp case. Mississippi follows pure comparative negligence, which reduces a recovery by the injured person’s share of fault rather than barring it. Louisiana now bars recovery for a claimant found 51 percent or more at fault for causes of action arising on or after January 1, 2026. Coordinating the two claims so they do not undercut each other is part of how we handle these cases.
Questions About Head and Brain Injury Claims
Does workers’ compensation cover a concussion even if my scans are normal?
Yes. Coverage depends on whether the injury arose from your work and whether you need treatment, not on what an imaging study shows. Many concussions leave CT and MRI results normal. Neurological examination, cognitive testing, and your treating doctor’s records are what establish the injury.
How long do I have to report a head injury at work?
In both Mississippi and Louisiana you should report to your employer right away and no later than 30 days after the accident. Reporting in writing and keeping a copy avoids disputes about whether notice was given.
How long do I have to file a claim in Mississippi?
Generally two years from the date of injury or the date of the last compensation payment, by filing a Petition to Controvert with the Mississippi Workers’ Compensation Commission. If no disability benefits were paid and no claim was filed within that period, the right to benefits can be lost.
What wage benefits can I receive while I cannot work?
Mississippi pays up to two-thirds of your average weekly wage for total disability, subject to a weekly maximum set by law and generally for no more than 450 weeks. Louisiana also pays a percentage of wages with its own weekly limits fixed by the date of the accident, and supplemental earnings benefits can apply if you return at reduced earnings.
Who pays for my medical care?
The employer’s insurer is responsible for reasonable and necessary treatment related to the work injury, including specialists, therapy, and testing. In Louisiana, a denied treatment request can be disputed by filing Form 1009 with the Office of Workers’ Compensation within 15 calendar days of receiving written notice of the denial.
Can I be fired for filing a claim for a head injury?
Both states protect workers from retaliation for filing a comp claim. If you were let go or punished after reporting your injury, tell your attorney during the consultation so the circumstances can be reviewed.
My symptoms showed up days after the accident. Is my claim weaker?
Delayed symptoms are common with head injuries and do not defeat a claim. What helps is prompt medical treatment once symptoms appear, a clear account of the original incident, and witnesses who saw the event or noticed changes in you afterward.
The insurer says my memory and mood problems are unrelated to work. What can I do?
Cognitive and emotional changes can be linked to a work injury through neuropsychological testing and physician opinions. Statements from family and coworkers about how you changed after the accident can also carry weight. An attorney can arrange the right evaluations and present them to the Commission or the Louisiana workers’ compensation judge.
What if the insurance company’s doctor says I can go back to work?
That opinion is not the final word. Your treating physician’s view and independent specialist evaluations can contradict it, and returning too early can worsen a brain injury. Do not go back to full duty or sign anything until your own doctor has cleared you.
Can I also sue someone other than my employer?
If a third party, such as a negligent driver or a contractor with an unsafe site, contributed to the injury, a separate injury claim may be available. Louisiana’s delictual claims generally carry a two-year period for injuries on or after July 1, 2024, and Mississippi’s general period is three years, so these deadlines run separately from the comp deadlines.
How do appeals work if my claim is denied?
In Mississippi, an Administrative Judge’s decision can be reviewed by the Full Commission on the existing record, and a final Commission award can be appealed within 30 days, with the Supreme Court often assigning the case to the Court of Appeals. In Louisiana, a workers’ compensation judge’s judgment can be appealed to the appropriate circuit court of appeal within the statutory deadlines, which are 30 days for an appeal that suspends the judgment and 60 days for one that does not.
Serving Meridian and Communities Across Mississippi and Louisiana
We represent injured workers in Meridian and throughout Lauderdale County, and in neighboring communities across east Mississippi. Our reach continues west through Jackson, Madison, and the Hinds and Rankin County area, south to Hattiesburg and the Gulf Coast, north toward Southaven and the northern part of the state, and into the Delta. Workers hurt on job sites, in plants, on the road, and in the industries that drive the region can call us whether the accident happened in a city or on a rural work site.
The firm also serves Louisiana, including New Orleans, Baton Rouge, Lafayette, Lake Charles, Shreveport, and communities across south Louisiana and north Louisiana. A head or brain injury claim often involves workers who travel between states for jobs, and our attorneys are prepared to handle claims under both Mississippi and Louisiana law.
Talk to a Meridian Brain Injury Attorney Today
If a blow to the head at work has left you with symptoms that are not going away, talk with a Meridian head injury attorney at Lunsford, Baskin & Priebe before the insurer shapes the story of what happened. Call us any time, day or night. Consultations are free, we advance the costs of the case, and you pay no fee unless we recover benefits for you. We help injured workers, and that is the work we do every day.
