Catastrophic injuries are named appropriately. They’re injuries you don’t necessarily recover from, as they might involve permanent spinal injuries or loss of limbs.
Your body might not ever be what it once was, but you can restore as much quality of life as possible and enjoy financial security if you get help from the right Tyrone catastrophic injury lawyer.
At Wade Law, we understand the financial loss and agony that comes with catastrophic injury cases. Our team of experienced personal lawyers can help you prove that another party was responsible for your injuries and help you recover compensation. Contact us online or call 770-282-1188 to schedule a free case evaluation today!
What Is a Catastrophic Injury?
Catastrophic injuries have direct repercussions that keep you from getting involved with meaningful work. basically, it’s an injury that permanently impairs you as a person. Examples include traumatic brain injuries or spinal cord injuries, as these kinds of injuries often seriously limit your functional capabilities. Severe burns can also count.
A catastrophic injury means that you’ve lost a crucial part of your overall persona. This might be something physical, such as a limb. However, it might also be a power to do something, be it something physical like walking, or mental, such as being able to formulate an entire thought.
Catastrophic Injuries Happen in Many Ways
Sports activities are a common source of catastrophic injuries. Football and ice hockey account for many, but cheerleading is actually the number one source among sports causes. Other frequent culprits are workplace accidents and vehicle collisions.
What Are the Long-Term Effects of Catastrophic Injuries?
Even if doctors can stabilize your physical health after a catastrophic injury, you might not be able to do many things you used to. For instance, if you can no longer walk or you lost an arm, then your previous line of work might not be open to you anymore, resulting in drastically reduced income. You’re also likely to undergo serious anxiety about your future while suffering the trauma of what’s happened to you. This further represses your quality of life and ability to take care of yourself.
Can I Sue for a Catastrophic Injury?
Personal injury laws in the state of Georgia do permit you the right of suing for catastrophic injury. The state follows a modified comparative fault method. So as long as you can prove you were hurt due to a person or some entity’s negligence and you were less than 50 percent at fault, you might be owed compensation.
Why Do I Need a Lawyer for a Catastrophic Injury Claim?
There are three ways that a lawyer can help you with a catastrophic injury claim.
Gather Evidence
The first is by gathering evidence. You might be fully aware of how and why you were catastrophically injured, and you might even believe you know who is responsible. While your own testimony will go a long way, it’s the statements of others and physical evidence that establishes your case in the eyes of others who weren’t there.
Your lawyer will collect all the possible evidence they can. They might even take steps to preserve evidence from being lost, destroyed, buried, or misplaced.
Negotiate a Settlement
The second thing they can do for you is negotiating for an out-of-court settlement. In many cases, you might be offered one before you even have a lawyer request one. Many insurance companies prefer to pay out a token settlement amount than pay lawyers for an expensive defense and possibly prolonged court trial.
However, the proposed settlements, at least among initial offers, can be much lower than you might need or deserve. Your lawyer can use the evidence they gather as leverage to negotiate a better settlement offer.
Represent You in Court
If settlement negotiations fail to produce a mutually agreeable settlement quickly enough, filing an actual court case will be necessary. Settlement negotiations likely will continue up until the actual court case, and possibly even after it starts. However, your attorney will prepare to represent you in the courtroom, whether it’s necessary or just to negotiate a settlement from a position of strength.
What Type of Damages Can I Recover in a Catastrophic Injury Claim?
You can recover three types of damages from a catastrophic injury claim in Tyrone, Georgia.
Economic Damages
These are damages that usually come with hard numbers that can be tangibly proven. Medical bills resulting from a catastrophic injury usually qualify, including emergency room visits, surgeries, medications, and therapy. Loss of income that you can no longer earn or generate would also count frequently.
Non-Economic Damages
Damages like these are usually harder to quantify as there might not be tangible things like specific bills you get in the mail for more subjective elements such as pain and suffering and loss of consortium or quality of life. Still, such things do matter, and the right lawyer can assign hard numbers to them after the right investigation and calculations.
Punitive Damages
An award of punitive damages is meant to punish the defendant for malicious or especially reckless behavior. Punitive damages are also called exemplary damages.
In some cases, the award for punitive damages might be far beyond the damages for financial losses. There is a cap on punitive damages in Georgia, but it doesn’t apply in drunk driving cases.
Contact Our Experienced Tyrone Catastrophic Injury Lawyers
Catastrophic injuries can happen at school, work, or on the road. They can permanently alter the course and quality of your life. Fortunately, recovery of damages is possible to help restore your income, or at least help you pay for a lifetime of rehab. A Tyrone catastrophic injury lawyer can help you with this.
Call us right away at 770-282-1188 to speak with someone on our team. At Wade Law, we have decades of experience handling personal injury cases in Georgia, and we offer a free initial consultation.
