Document your injury: the four-part evidence file

The record ties injury to collision

An injury claim is built from records made at the time, not from memories reconstructed later — and delayed onset makes contemporaneous records the load-bearing wall. The file has four parts:

• The crash record — the police report, photographs of the vehicles and scene, and the SR-1 report to the DMV.
• The medical record — exam notes, imaging, and treatment logs, week by week. The imaging file covers the studies.
• The loss record — missed work, modified duty, out-of-pocket costs, and the stubs and receipts that prove them.
• The statement record — your own dated notes: what hurts, when, and how it limits you. The symptom log from the delayed-onset file is this record's first page.

Day one, before the pain peaks

After safety and medical needs, the scene work is evidence work. Photograph the vehicles from all four corners, the damage to each, the roadway, and anything that marks position. Exchange driver, registration, and insurance information. The police report is the anchor document — but the photographs are yours, and they do not wait on anyone's schedule.

Where the collision involves injury, death, or property damage above the statutory threshold, California requires the driver to file a written SR-1 report with the DMV within 10 days (Vehicle Code §20008). The SR-1 is the driver's own report to the state — separate from the police report, and required whether or not officers responded.

The deadlines that structure everything

• 10 days — the SR-1 report to the DMV (Vehicle Code §20008).
• Days, not weeks — the first evaluation. Symptoms that declare 24–72 hours after a crash are the rule, and the first record starts the documentation chain.
• 2 years — the statute of limitations for a personal-injury lawsuit (Code of Civil Procedure §335.1). A claim documented on day 700 is a claim; on day 731, unless filed, it is a memory.

Work impact is evidence

A soft-tissue injury that changes how you work leaves a paper trail worth keeping: the dates you missed, the duties you modified, the notes and forms from your employer. Wage loss is claimed from records, not recollections — and a neck that makes driving painful has its own documentation story in San Diego traffic.