After auto accidents, victims may be unsure if their injuries or damages warrant civil action, and if filing a lawsuit would be worth it. Our attorneys can review your case, possibly identifying damages you did not know were compensable, and explaining your likely recovery if you were to sue the at-fault driver.
For example, car accident lawsuits generally enable victims to recover the medical damages they have incurred from their injuries. In addition to emergency room costs, we will seek compensation for follow-up appointments, physical therapy sessions, prescription medications, and any other expenses related to your care. On top of that, we will assess your lost wages, calculating how much income you have missed since the accident and because of the defendant. We will also spend time evaluating your non-economic damages, making sure to seek relief for the physical pain and mental suffering you have endured since the car crash.
For a free and confidential case review from Rice Law, call our car accident lawyers now at (410) 694-7291.
Reasons to File a Lawsuit After a Car Accident in Beltsville
Suffering injuries that lead to medical expenses, lost wages, and other damages because a negligent driver hit you in Beltsville is plenty of reason to file a lawsuit and seek compensation. Our attorneys can track all hospital expenses from after the accident onward, calculate your missed income and possible future lost wages, and quantify the non-economic damages you have incurred that require different calculation methods, like physical pain and mental suffering.
You Incur Medical Damages
Incurring medical damages is exceptionally common after car accidents. When vehicles collide at high speeds, perhaps forcing cars to slip or roll over, occupants might suffer permanent or sometimes fatal injuries. Even when victims’ physical recovery timelines are relatively quick, their medical damages might be very expensive. One visit to the emergency room, followed by appointments with doctors and specialists, not to mention possible surgeries and physical therapy, means costly medical bills for victims. This is a major reason for victims to prioritize their lawsuits against negligent drivers. The longer you wait to sue, the more difficult it may be for you to handle your medical bills, particularly if you cannot work while you are physically recovering. We will focus on obtaining medical records that confirm your specific injuries, diagnoses, and treatments thus far, as well as copies of the bills detailing the exact cost of your care. For many victims, follow-up appointments past the end of lawsuits are necessary for their full physical recoveries. This means future medical damages will be incurred in many cases, and our lawyers will make sure those anticipated losses are covered in your case by having physicians and experts testify in court.
Even though medical damages might get overwhelming, it is crucial for your lawsuit that you do not pause your treatment or neglect it in any way. Gaps in medical records might welcome unwanted questions about the seriousness of your injuries and if they warrant compensation, which can be largely avoided by sticking to your treatment plan.
You Incur Lost Wages
It is common for victims to be unable to go back to work, sometimes for days, weeks, months, or possibly even years after car accidents, depending on their injuries. Displaced fractures, some of the common injuries suffered in accidents, are challenging to heal from. Broken bones may require surgeries, casts, and the use of crutches or wheelchairs, creating physical limitations for victims that prevent them from doing their jobs. The result is lost wages, which are compensable damages after car accidents. To confirm your income before the crash and show how much you deserve for lost wages, our car accident lawyers will use employment records, recent paychecks, and tax returns. If your injuries have disrupted your ability to work and your occupational trajectory, we can have experts review your case and prepare statements for court explaining your reduced earning capacity and how that translates into long-term lost wages because of the defendant’s negligence.
You Incur Other Out-of-Pocket Expenses
Incurring lots of smaller out-of-pocket expenses compared to the total cost of medical bills, for example, might add up to much more than you anticipated. The cost of property damage to your vehicle, in-house medical assistance, childcare expenses, and home alterations to accommodate permanent injuries and mobility aids, like wheelchairs, are all compensable, provided our lawyers can prove these expenses were incurred because of the car accident caused by the defendant.
You Incur Intangible Damages
Physical injuries have very real mental and emotional consequences for car accident victims. When it comes to quantifying these damages, our lawyers use one of two methods, either the per diem method or the multiplier method. The per diem method works by assigning a daily rate to a victim’s physical pain and mental suffering and multiplying that by the number of days our lawyers and experts anticipate them incurring non-economic damages. On the other hand, the multiplier method works by first choosing a multiplier, which may be between 1.5 and 5, depending on the seriousness of the victim’s injuries and other factors, and multiplying that by the victims’ total economic damages. Unfortunately, many victims underestimate their non-economic damages, thinking that the financial consequences of physical injuries outweigh any mental suffering they might endure. They might also struggle to quantify their non-economic damages independently without help from our lawyers, who have experience doing so and can identify the calculation method that will help to maximize victims’ recoveries.
Maintaining a journal after an accident to keep note of the mental anguish or emotional distress you experience can help us prove your non-economic damages at trial. Furthermore, confiding in mental health professionals about the anxiety or depression you have felt can lead to expert testimony, which is often compelling to juries when awarding non-economic damages to car accident victims.
Call Our Lawyers to Talk About Your Car Accident Case in Beltsville
For a free case assessment from Rice Law, call our car accident lawyers at (410) 694-7291 today.