What is Fair Compensation for Pain and Suffering?

Injury victims may be eligible to be compensated for their medical bills, lost wages, and damage to property. Perhaps not as widely known, an injured party may be able to receive additional compensation for pain and suffering.

In this article, our personal injury lawyers give an overview of what encompasses pain and suffering and two methods an attorney may employ to calculate fair compensation.

What is Pain and Suffering?

Pain and suffering is any physical and emotional injuries that a victim suffers as a result of an accident. Pain and suffering is one form of non-economic damages, which are non-monetary losses that impact a person’s ability to live a normal life.

If you have a loved one who has experienced nursing home abuse for example, your family member will likely be able to claim damages. Along with medical expenses, he or she may have intangible losses for pain and suffering as well.

When a victim suffers any physical or emotional distress, this qualifies as pain and suffering. Pain and suffering can also arise if you have sustained physical impairment or disfigurement as a result of your accident, causing you to live a diminished quality of life.

Calculating Pain and Suffering Damages

At Banks, Stubbs & McFarland, in some cases we use the multiplier method to calculate noneconomic damages. This method assigns a number from 1 to 10 based on the severity of your injury and the type of case.

When using this method, we multiply it by the total amount of economic damages to come up with the amount of noneconomic damages. In many serious injury and commercial vehicle cases, juries accept this method of calculating your pain and suffering damages.

If your injury caused you to miss significant time from work, then you may consider using the per diem method. This method assigns a dollar value based on your average daily wage. You would receive this amount for every day that you are unable to return to work due to your injuries. It is helpful to give the jury several options for ways to calculate pain and suffering.

In determining damages, an insurance adjuster, jury, or judge will examine the following factors:

  • The severity of your injuries
  • The impact of the injuries on your life
  • Your ability or inability to work
  • How long it took for you to recover
  • Your medical prognosis
  • Medical treatments you have received and future medical needs
  • The defendant’s level of negligence
  • Emotional distress
  • Loss of consortium
  • Loss of enjoyment of life

A Cumming, GA Personal Injury Lawyer Ready to Help You

In life, it is crucial to always prepare for the unexpected. Even in doing so, we can never entirely avoid getting hurt. If you have recently been in an accident, we want to hear from you. Contact our office today to find out how we can be of assistance to you.