Finding yourself injured due to someone else is often extremely distressful and costly, even when they meant no harm by accident. Filing a personal injury lawsuit might help alleviate some of your financial strain in managing medical related bills today – discover everything necessary about personal injury law so as to file one successfully!
What is Personal Injury Law?
Many people are unaware that personal injury law even exists, much less what it actually means. For those who don’t know, personal injury law is a subset of tort law which deals with rectifying one parties actions against another when one of the parties was injured. This rectification comes in the form of monetary compensation for the injuries that the party suffered. The basis of all personal injury lawsuits rests on the party who caused the injury to have acted with negligence.
Common Types of Personal Injury
Reading up on the definition of a personal injury lawsuit, but actually understanding what this lawsuit entails is another. The best way to understand the basics of a personal injury lawsuit is to look at some common examples that occur in court frequently:
Animal Attacks
First and foremost, off-leash animal attacks are a common type of personal injury lawsuit seen in the modern day. The most typical example of this is when an owner who has a pet with a vicious history chooses to not exercise caution with their animal. Whether that lack of judgement is not putting a leash on their pet or allowing it to roam, the animal then attack another person or animal could lead to a lawsuit.
Vehicle Collisions
While most auto and pedestrian accidents are typically covered by insurance companies, in certain situations it might be wiser to file a personal injury suit instead. For instance, when someone behind the wheel of their car opts to text while they drive and cause serious accidents as a result, then filing such suit would likely be more appropriate than working through insurance claims alone.
Medical Malpractice
While everyone wants to believe that their healthcare professionals have their best interests at heart, the truth is that some professionals do not. Someone who violates their oath to act in a patient’s best interest may be engaging in medical malpractice, which could be grounds for a personal injury lawsuit. Even something as small as performing an unnecessary procedure without notifying patients could constitute negligence and be grounds for legal action against them – something such as accidental over-medication could constitute malpractice under medical negligence law.
Slip-and-fall Accidents
Finally, another commonly seen personal injury case is a slip-and-fall accident in a store. These types of cases occur when the floor around an area has either been wiped down or is wet for another reason and there is not proper signage indicating this. When a person then falls down and injures themselves because they could not tell the floor was wet, a slip-and-fall personal injury lawsuit may be applicable.
The Role of Negligence in Personal Injury
As previously discussed, one of the central elements of any personal injury case is negligence. This term simply refers to acting in ways which show disregard for others’ wellbeing – or, put differently: acting with negligence means behaving in ways any regular person would not behave under similar circumstances.
For perspective, a person choosing to grab their phone while they are driving falls under the realm of either negligence or recklessness because there are laws against it and drivers understand it is inherently dangerous. Therefore, by choosing to still engage in the action, a person is demonstrating a disregard for the wellbeing of others around them.
Reiterating my prior point, the reason it must be shown that someone has committed negligence lies within personal injury law: there are four elements which must be proven for each claim: duty of care, breach of duty of care, proximate causation and related damages. By choosing the right personal injury lawyer you can ensure that each of the above elements is adequately proven so that you can get compensated as soon as possible.
How Much Can a Person Win from Personal Injury?
Many individuals forgo personal injury lawsuits out of fear they won’t see enough return for their efforts in terms of adequate compensation, when in reality – depending on the specifics of a case – this amount could potentially reach quite significant.
As an overall average, personal injury lawsuits typically yield earnings of roughly $30k after legal fees have been subtracted; though awards for certain forms of malpractice such as medical can reach hundreds of thousands. To truly gauge what earnings your personal injury lawsuit might yield you must speak with a specialized personal injury lawyer about its details in order to understand whether any money may have been left on the table.
The Bottom Line
Filing a personal injury suit may not always be necessary depending on your individual circumstances; more serious charges could result from evidence showing someone was acting recklessly rather than negligently; take time to discuss all aspects of your situation with an experienced personal injury lawyer so all evidence has been properly covered; once this information has been secured it should only remain for court ruling to decide its validity or otherwise.
