Personal Injury Overview

When your personal injury attorney begins building your case, one of the first things they will do is determine exactly what you may be eligible to recover in compensation.

The goal of a personal injury lawsuit is to recover a fair compensation for the losses, also referred to as damages, that happened as a result of your injury. These damages extend to future losses that would not have happened if not for your injury.

Damages include:

• Past and future medical expenses
• Property damage expenses
• Lost income
• Reduced earning capacity
• Pain and suffering
• Emotional distress
• Punitive damages

Medical Expenses

The largest part of a personal injury claim is usually made up of medical expenses. The cost of treatment after an injury can be overwhelming for many people and sometimes it may take months or years for an injury to heal, if it ever does at all.

You may be eligible to receive compensation for your medical bills, both current and future. This includes the initial cost of treatment as well as any future care you will need as a result of your injuries.

Property Damage

Depending on the exact nature of your accident, you may be eligible to recover for damage to your property.

For instance, in a car accident, you may be able to recover for the cost of the vehicle entirely in order to replace it or in part in order to have the vehicle repaired.

Lost Income

After an injury, you may be unable to work. This may only be for a few days or it could be for the rest of your life depending on the circumstances of the injury.

In cases where an injured party is unable to work, you can make a claim to recover the lost income as part of a personal injury lawsuit.

Reduced Earning Capacity

Recovering for reduced earning capacity is similar to making a claim for lost income. In some accidents, an injured person is able to return to work but they may not be able to do the same job ever again. In some cases this means that they may not be able to make as much as they were making before the injury.

In cases like these, you may be eligible to file a claim for reduced earning capacity.

Pain and Suffering

Injured people may be entitled to compensation when they experience pain, discomfort, and anguish as a result of their injuries.

Pain and suffering claims are often calculated based upon a multiplier that is applied to the other damages that you are attempting to recover as a part of your case.

Emotional Distress

Emotional distress is related to pain and suffering. Sometimes the psychological trauma of an injury or accident causes the victim to experience great emotional pain. This may come in the form of nightmares, anxiety, and other forms of distress.

Punitive Damages

One other type of damage that may apply in your case is punitive damages. When someone acts maliciously or with gross negligence and those actions lead to another person’s injury, punitive damages may apply.

This type of damage is intended to punish the defendant and deter others from acting in the same way.

Punitive damages are rare but, depending on your case, you may be able to seek this form of compensation against the other party.

In Kentucky, the fault party must have acted with “oppression, fraud or malice” in order to prove that punitive damages apply.