Navigating the aftermath of a personal injury can be confusing, especially when dealing with the physical, emotional, and financial fallout. You may decide that it’s in your best interest to pursue a personal injury claim. If you do, you may receive “economic” and “non-economic damages.”
You have the right to seek compensation if someone’s negligence led to your losses. Learn more about calculating the full value of your claim, and how a personal injury attorney can help.
Why Can I Seek Damages with a Personal Injury Accident?
As a personal injury accident victim, you can seek compensation for damages from someone else’s negligence. This can include car accidents, slip-and-falls, work accidents, and more.
If another person is found liable for the accident, you might be able to collect economic and non-economic damages.
Economic damages include medical expenses and lost income, which have specific dollar amounts. Pain and suffering, considered “non-economic damages,” are more subjective. You may seek compensation for physical and emotional pain and suffering.
What’s the Difference Between Physical and Emotional Pain and Suffering?
Pain and suffering can be broken down into two categories.
Physical Pain and Suffering
This includes your current physical pain and suffering as well as the distress and discomfort you will likely experience in the future.
Compensation for physical pain and suffering might cover:
- numbness and tingling in the extremities
- back pain
- nerve damage
- traumatic brain injury
- internal organ damage
Emotional Pain and Suffering
Mental or emotional pain and suffering encompasses all the emotional distress someone might experience. This can include experiences like:
- shock
- trauma
- depression
- fear
- anxiety
- dread
- loss of enjoyment of life
- mental anguish
How Do I Prove Pain and Suffering After an Accident?
Your personal injury lawyer will help determine whether you have a case qualifying for pain and suffering compensation. You can collect many types of evidence to build up a strong personal injury case.
- Medical Bills: Bills from any medical treatment you received.
- Medical Documentation: Documents for any medical visits, including physical and mental therapy.
- Medical Testimony: Written opinions from medical doctors and mental health professionals about how your condition could impact your life.
- Expert Testimony: Opinions from third-party medical witnesses that support your testimony.
- Visual Injury Proof: Before-and-after photos of the damage to your vehicle, as well as any images showing injuries after the accident and post-accident scarring, discoloration, or disfigurement.
- Medication List: A list of any medications for physical and mental conditions prescribed after the accident.
- Personal Journal or Diary Entries: A journal that outlines your day-to-day experience with physical and mental pain and how it has impacted your life, job, relationships, and mental health.
- Witness Statements: Testimony from witnesses talking about how your injuries have affected your life.
Calculating Pain and Suffering in Personal Injury Cases
Calculating pain and suffering can be complex, as it involves assessing damages that do not have a clear monetary value.
Some of the damages and factors considered when assessing your pain and suffering could include:
- The extent of the defendant’s negligent behavior and whether punitive damages apply
- The severity of your injuries and how long it could take you to heal
- The typical level of physical and mental pain suffered by your type of injuries
- How the injuries have impacted your life
- Your employment and how it was affected by the incident
- Your current and future medical treatment
How a Farmington Personal Injury Attorney Can Help You
Calculating the compensation for your pain and suffering can be a challenge on your own.
Hiring a personal injury attorney will help you develop a strategy for receiving the financial compensation you need.
Whether you’re dealing with hospital bills, lost wages, emotional distress, or physical pain, your attorney will support you every step of the way.
Call Patscheck Law Today
At Patscheck Law, our personal injury attorneys are here to help you figure out just how much you’re owed.
We’ll handle the complex legal aspects of your case so you can focus on getting the care and treatment you need.
Contact us today to schedule your free consultation so you don’t have to shoulder the burden of someone else’s negligence.