Pain and Suffering Damages – How to maximize your recovery

How do I make sure I’m compensated for my pain and suffering?

The best way to maximize your compensation for your pain and suffering is to hire a personal injury lawyer. It also helps to fully understand what compensation you are entitled to receive in a personal injury claim. Many people underestimate the compensation they deserve for their pain and suffering. Attorneys often use the multiplier method to estimate a fair amount.

What are pain and suffering damages?

Pain and suffering damages are a type of financial compensation that you can recover in a personal injury claim. They aim to compensate you for the physical pain and mental suffering caused by the accident that hurt you.

There are 2 types of damages that you can recover in a lawsuit:

1. compensatory damages, and
2. punitive damages.

Compensatory damages compensate you for your losses from the accident. They aim to make you whole, once again.

Compensation for your pain and suffering is one type of the compensatory damages that you are entitled to receive.

Punitive damages aim to punish the defendant for especially bad conduct and to deter it in the future. They are extremely rare to win in a personal injury case based on the defendant’s negligence.

What are the types of compensatory damages?

There are 2 big types of compensatory damages:

1. economic damages, sometimes referred to as special damages, and
2. non-economic damages, which are sometimes called general damages.

Your economic damages are those that can be stated in a dollar amount fairly easily. They include your:

• medical expenses,
• lost wages, and
• property damage.

All of these losses are shown from your repair costs or medical bills or can be calculated using your income and work time lost.

Your non-economic damages are those that cannot be easily stated in a dollar amount. They include:

• your physical and mental pain and suffering,
• your loss of enjoyment of life,
• your emotional distress,
• your mental anguish, and
• the loss of consortium suffered by your family members or loved ones.

Under California personal injury law, there is no fixed standard for deciding the amount of these damages.¹ Even though it can be difficult to say what these types of injuries are worth, though, that does not mean that you did not suffer them. When you were hurt by someone else’s negligence, you deserve to be compensated for them.

How much am I entitled to receive in a personal injury case?

You are entitled to recover financial compensation for all of your legal damages. This includes money for all of your economic and non-economic losses.

Calculating the extent of your losses can be difficult. Calculating pain and suffering and other non-economic losses is especially tricky. Many personal injury attorneys and insurance adjusters use the multiplier method.

What is the multiplier method?

The multiplier method is a way to estimate how much compensation you are entitled to receive in a personal injury claim. You can use it if you were hurt in a:

• car accident, including a ride share accident,
• truck accident,
• bicycle accident,
• pedestrian accident,
• slip and fall,
• medical malpractice incident, or
• dog bite incident.

The multiplier method uses the following formula: Economic damages + [economic damages x multiplier].

It starts by totaling up your economic damages. These are easy to put into a dollar amount. They are reflected by your bills and your lost income.

It then assigns a number between 1 and 5 to your accident. This is the multiplier. The more the accident has affected your quality of life, the higher the number will be.

Your economic damages are then multiplied by this number. This estimates your non-economic damages.

The product of this multiplication is then added to your economic damages. This amount of money is used as an estimated damage award for your case.

For example: Dave is in a serious motorcycle accident. He suffers numerous physical injuries. X-rays and other tests show broken bones, severe injuries that will cause a disfigurement and impairments, and a brain injury. He also suffers emotional trauma and post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD). Based on his medical records and expert testimony about his job loss, Dave’s economic damages are $800,000. His personal injury lawyer and the insurance adjuster agree to use a multiplier of 4.5 for his accident. This is based on the severity of the injuries and the emotional pain they are causing Dave. The multiplier method estimates Dave’s non-economic damages, including his pain and suffering, at $3,600,000. Based on this calculation, a fair settlement offer would be $4,400,000.

How can a personal injury lawyer help me?

A personal injury lawyer from a California law firm can help you by maximizing your pain and suffering damages. An attorney can do this by:

• informing you of what you are entitled to receive,
• negotiating with the insurance company for a better settlement offer, and
• filing a personal injury or wrongful death claim if a fair offer is not made.

Many auto accident victims underappreciate the amount of compensation they are entitled to receive. Claimants tend to focus on the costs of their medical treatment for their bodily injuries. When they are offered a settlement from the insurance company or provider that covers those bills, they may accept it in the thought that they are not entitled to anything more. A personal injury lawyer can let you know what your case is really worth. This can let you make informed decisions about whether to accept or reject settlement offers.

An attorney can advocate on your behalf during these settlement talks. This can relieve you of the stress of these negotiations. You can focus on recovering, instead. You can also rely on the skills and experience of an attorney who has gone through these negotiations numerous times before.

If no fair settlement offer is made, a lawyer can file a personal injury lawsuit for you. Once filed, settlement talks continue. If no settlement is reached for your claim, your lawyer can present your case in court for the jury to decide.

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