Yes, they can say it. That doesn't make it true.

If you were driving straight through a green light in Providence and some driver cut left across your lane, the starting point is simple: the left-turning driver is usually supposed to yield.

That's basic road-rule stuff. At a green light, a driver turning left across oncoming traffic has to wait until it's clear. On streets around downtown Providence, near North Main, Broad Street, or the mess of ramps feeding I-95, people gamble on that turn constantly. Then they swear you came out of nowhere.

Now the ugly part.

The insurance company sends you to an IME, which stands for "independent medical exam," even though it's often about as independent as a casino host. The doctor spends ten minutes with you, taps your knee, asks if you can raise your arm, and writes that your MRI findings are "degenerative," "mild," or "not clinically significant."

Meanwhile your MRI shows a disc herniation, labral tear, or nerve impingement.

That disconnect is not rare. It's the play.

The IME is built to shrink your claim

If you're a rideshare driver, this gets even more stressful because you're not just dealing with pain. You're losing fares. Time off the road in Providence means missing airport runs, train station pickups, late-night bar traffic around Federal Hill, and those short downtown rides that add up when Route 146 and I-95 are jammed.

The carrier knows that financial pressure can make people fold.

An IME doctor is not there to treat you. Not really. That doctor is there to give the insurer a medical opinion they can use to question whether the crash caused your symptoms, whether you still need care, and whether your restrictions are real.

Here's what most people don't realize: an MRI does not automatically win the argument by itself.

Insurance companies love saying the scan shows something old, not something caused by the crash. They'll point to age-related wear, prior aches, old chiropractic visits, gym injuries, anything. If you had zero pain before the collision and real symptoms right after, that matters. A lot. But they still try to muddy it up.

In Rhode Island, fault and injury are two separate fights

The left-turn driver can be mostly dead wrong and you can still get dragged into a second battle over your body.

That's the part that blindsides people.

Liability is one fight: who caused the crash.

Medical causation is another: did this crash cause these injuries and this treatment.

In Rhode Island, comparative negligence can also creep in if the other side claims you were speeding, distracted, or "could have avoided it." So while the left-turn setup usually favors the driver going straight on green, the insurer may attack both fault and injury at once.

For a rideshare driver, there's also a record trail. App status. Ride data. GPS movement. Trip timing. That can help show you were driving normally through the intersection when the other car turned across you.

The timing of your treatment matters more than people think

If the ER record says neck pain, shoulder pain, low back pain, headache, and then your MRI later shows injuries that fit those complaints, that's useful.

If the records are spotty, the insurer jumps on it.

That means gaps in treatment, skipped follow-ups, and trying to "push through" because you need money can hurt the case. The adjuster doesn't give a damn that you needed to keep driving to cover rent in Elmwood or Pawtucket. They'll still argue you must not have been that injured.

The records that usually matter most are:

• ER notes from the first day, imaging reports, your follow-up doctor's findings, and any work or driving restrictions placed on you

Not because paperwork is magical. Because consistency is.

If the IME says "normal exam," look at what they ignored

Read that IME report carefully.

Did the doctor mention the exact MRI findings? Did they address muscle spasms, reduced range of motion, numbness, radiating pain, weakness, sleep disruption, or the fact that driving all day makes it worse? Did they explain why the crash didn't cause the symptoms, or did they just slap on the word "degenerative" and move on?

That word gets abused constantly.

A lot of adults have some degeneration and no symptoms. Then a crash in Providence flips the switch. The legal question usually isn't whether your spine was factory-new before impact. It's whether the collision caused a new injury, aggravated an old condition, or turned something quiet into something painful and disabling.

That distinction matters when an MRI is clear and the insurer still acts like you're making it up.

Especially when the hit came from a driver who turned left right in front of you on green.