What is Included in Pain and Suffering – Planning Your Demand Statement

A demand statement is your big opportunity to establish what you expect to come out of this claim. In that, you can include the property damage, your medical bills, and pain and suffering. But it’s hard to understand what exactly falls into that catch-all category. Pain and suffering could be the highest figure listed on your demand statement. However, it’s also the hardest to actualize during negotiations.

Speaking with a Beaumont car accident attorney is critical after a crash partially because of pain and suffering. You can’t throw just anything onto your pain and suffering claim, but also, you don’t want to miss an opportunity to get compensation for something caused by the wreck. It’s a tricky tightrope to walk.

Legal Definitions

Under the legal definition, the pain and suffering in a civil lawsuit can include damages that arise from physical or mental duress. It can also include the side-effects of damages, for example, the loss of a job due to the physical injuries that made the victim incapable of performing job functions.

When considering the many pain and suffering possibilities, it’s more likely that you’ll need the support of a local personal injury attorney. Pain and suffering can include everything from that trauma, to lost earning possibilities. The very broad legal definition allows for attorneys and victims to interpret pain and suffering in very different ways.

Embarrassment and Scarring

Embarrassment and scaring are seldom reviewed with a critical eye in the scope of pain and suffering. If someone was in a car wreck and experienced substantial burning across their face, even insurance companies would have a hard time denying them some type of compensation.

Even things like permanent baldness from burns or scarring can result in embarrassment or disfigurement additions to a demand statement. It all comes down to the extent of the damage and how you intended to live your life. A person who cut hair for a living, and thus their own hair helped them get clients would have a bigger impact than someone else.

Does Pain and Suffering Include Future Medical Costs and Lost Wages?

No, pain and suffering do not include medical costs, but it can include lost wages. Lost wages and loss of potential earning can fall into pain and suffering if the circumstances are right.

Basically, the medical costs will never fit directly into pain and suffering. But the emotional distress from the medical experiences and trauma can become part of the pain and suffering figure.

Lost wages and lost earning potential only fit in when it goes beyond economic losses. For example, if you loved the company you were with, and there’s no way that you could return, then you could include that loss in pain and suffering.

What Happens When Pain and Suffering Don’t Have a Dollar Value?

It’s really difficult when you don’t have direct expenses, such as a bill to reference. Pain and suffering can include elements that are hard to give a value, such as scarring or emotional trauma. Instead, these amounts do come to a logical figure, but they often rely on the use of specialists.

Assigning something a dollar value when it is truly beyond monetary value is really tough, but it’s possible. Working with experts can help build a case to transparently show the full impact of the damages. Within pain and suffering falls, loss of consortium, companionship, and life moments. In a wrongful death case, a family member could attempt to put a dollar value to the father-daughter dance or missing a graduation with a loved one because of this crash or injury. These experiences are nearly impossible to set a dollar amount to, but sometimes it’s the only relief a victim or their family can get.

Should You Contact a Car Accident Injury Attorney

Generally speaking, yes. Even if you only go through a consultation with a personal injury attorney, it can be helpful to identify if you will or will need more help. Often if you don’t have a case, the attorneys won’t jump to take it because they won’t get much out of it either. Additionally, it’s not advantageous for attorneys to take cases for $2,000 in property damage.

Now, if you come in for a consultation and clearly have medical bills, property damage, and pain and suffering, then you’ll need that support. Talk to us as Brent Coon and Associates for guidance on whether you need legal help, and what you could include in your demand letter. Reach out to us now for the friendliest and most informative consultation in Texas.