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Flip-flops and falls: How not to wreck your personal injury case

On Behalf of | Jun 21, 2019 | Premises Liability |

If you’re like a lot of people, you love summer — and you may spend a good portion of the summer wearing nothing on your feet but flip-flops.

That could be a problem. Not only are flip-flops bad for your health, but they also put you in greater danger of a slip-and-fall accident — and they could cost you any chance of recovering compensation for your injuries.

Yes, flip-flops are an iconic summer staple among footwear, but there are a number of major problems with them. First of all, many are cheaply made. There’s a reason you can pick up a pair for less than $5 at every drug store or dollar store. The soles don’t do anything for your arches, the toe holder may pop loose at an inconvenient moment and there’s no guarantee that the bottoms will grant you any traction on a tile floor inside a store or beside a pool.

Foot fractures, sprained ankles, broken bones and falls are often the result of wearing flip-flops in public. Aside from not being stable footwear, flip-flops throw off an individual’s normal gait and foot rotation — which ends up making it harder to balance.

You can also bet that if you’re involved in a slip-and-fall accident on someone else’s property that the defense is going to want to see the footwear you had on at the time of the fall. If you were wearing flip-flops, they may be able to convince a jury that you were basically courting trouble and mostly (or completely) responsible for your own accident — even if the property owner was somehow negligent.

To protect your health and your financial future, kick off the flip-flops and find a sturdy, stable shoe for your summer errands. A slip-on sneaker is far less likely to result in a fall — or problems in court.

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