How Much Is Pain and Suffering Worth in Your Personal Injury Case?

shutterstock_290089598When someone is involved in a car accident or other type of personal injury case, there’s a good chance they are going to be seeking financial compensation for pain and suffering. This type of compensation is common for people to ask for because they want to receive extra money for their troubles, not just enough money to pay for their medical bills and car repairs. Many people who are involved in accidents experience trauma afterwards that prevents them from being able to drive a car by themselves, or even from being in a vehicle at all. These people may need to go through counseling and receive other forms of emotional support so they can continue living their life normally. In these instances, the victim is well within their rights to ask for extra money because of the pain and suffering that resulted from their case.

Determining Pain and Suffering in a Personal Injury Case

There are many things that will be looked at to determine pain and suffering value. First of all, the amount of pain a victim had to endure will directly contribute to how much money they can be awarded in their case. For example, someone who was involved in an accident where a driver crashed into their car and sustained several broken bones may go through months of pain because of their injuries. Lawyers will look at the length of time it took for someone to be rehabilitated, the medications they were prescribed, and the reports from the doctors who treated them. All of these things can help determine just how much pain a victim was truly in. The victim can be compensated for this because they would not have had to go through this level of pain if it weren’t for the at-fault party’s mistake.

Another thing that will determine how much money a victim can get for pain and suffering is how badly their lifestyle was affected. If someone was a professional golfer and their arm was damaged in an accident to the point that they can no longer use it the same for the rest of their life, then they will be able to seek a large amount of money for this. This is especially true if the person who was injured actually made a living off of playing golf. Even if someone just played golf on the weekends with their friends and co-workers, they can still seek compensation for pain and suffering because they are no longer able to partake in the things they enjoyed in life because of the at-fault party’s negligence.

Determining the Value of Your Pain and Suffering

After it has been determined that you are eligible to seek financial compensation for pain and suffering, your lawyer is going to need to figure out just how much money you can ask for. There are many ways this can be done. In the past, pain and suffering used to be calculated by simply multiplying the cost of your medical bills and car repairs by three. However, this method has not been used in recent years because it’s not as reliable. There have been cases where people were involved in accidents where they only had to take a few days off of work, even though their car was completely totaled. If someone was driving a $60,000 car and it was completely destroyed, but they are not in much pain because they didn’t sustain any extensive or permanent injuries, then many judges feel that it’s unreasonable for them to ask for $180,000 in compensation. This is why other methods have been used in recent years to come up with a better value for pain and suffering.

Although each case is different and there are many factors that will determine how much money you can seek in your case, there are some common ways of figuring out just how much your pain and suffering is worth. One of the more reliable ways to come up with a number for pain and suffering is to calculate how much money you make at work each day. Once you figure out your daily rate, it can be applied to how many days you had to take off of work. Depending on your particular job, you may have been able to go back to work fairly soon, even if you were still dealing with your injury. In this instance, you can apply your daily rate to the amount of time it took for you to be completely healed from your injury. This doesn’t necessarily mean that the exact day your broken bone was healed; it could mean the day you actually finished going through physical rehabilitation.

While there are basic ways to calculate how much your pain and suffering may be worth, it is imperative to mention that each case is different. This is so important because there are many things that need to be taken into account to come up with the right number. For example, if your leg was injured in an accident and you can never ride a bicycle again, which was something you used to do daily for personal pleasure or for exercise, your lawyer is going to mention this in court. This information is going to be crucial, and it can definitely help if your case is going to trial; a jury will be much more apt to award you the money you’re asking for if they know that the at-fault party affected your life in such a drastic way. The way an accident affected your personal or professional life is definitely going to be taken into consideration when determining the value of your pain and suffering.

If you have recently been involved in an accident within the state of Arizona and need to hire a personal injury lawyer, get in touch with Tobler Law. This firm has extensive experience with all types of personal injury cases, and they also have an excellent track record for getting their clients the compensation they deserve for pain and suffering.

«

»