Carolina Personal Injury News

UNC Chapel Hill Buying Bed Rails For Bunks After Fatal Head Injury

Posted on Sep 28, 2010

The demand for bunk bed rails at the University of North Carolina – Chapel Hill has skyrocketed after a student’s mother fell from the top bunk of a dorm room bed and died of a traumatic brain injury.

According to the Associated Press, 49-year-old Donna Sykes was visiting her daughter Jesse at college and sleeping on the girl’s top bunk bed when she fell to the floor below and suffered a fatal head injury. The first-year college student had recently transferred from a community college and who suffers from cerebral palsy. Her mother was staying in her daughter’s room to help her adjust to college life.

Since the fatal head injury accident, UNC is struggling with a new demand from students for safety rails for their bunk beds. About 1,100 students have requested bed rails for their bunks – but only some have received them. The 100 rails ordered for the new semester are already gone and Chapel Hill has already borrowed more from neighboring school North Carolina State University. The school says that buying rails for the 8,500 beds throughout campus would cost a quarter million dollars.

While it is still unclear why Sykes’ fall was fatal or how exactly the head injury occurred, school officials are in agreement that bed rails should be provided for all students who want one and that the solution should come about as quickly as possible. While the school normally receive about 30 requests for bed rails each semester, the head injury accidents has put the safety feature in the spotlight.

About the Editors: Shapiro, Lewis & Appleton is a law firm whose attorneys focus on injury and accident law and have experience handling traumatic brain injury and closed head injuries. In fact, our firm in 2000 helped a brain-damaged client receive what was then the largest verdict for a brain injury case in Virginia history. Then in the year 2012 our firm helped a brain injury client receive a $21 million dollar verdict.

Rick Shapiro and James Lewis have been listed among the Best Lawyers in America since 2008 and and we have been named a North Carolina "Best Law Firm" for personal injury law since 2010 by U.S. News & World Report. In addition, Rick and Jim have been listed in the National Million Dollar Advocates Forum since 2009 and our firm has the highest rating of AV from national lawyer ranking organization Martindale-Hubbell. That means we have a reputation for demonstrating preeminent legal skill.
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