Personal injuries involve harm to your person rather than to property. These can be physical, mental, or emotional injuries. If someone else’s negligent or deliberate actions lead to harm, an individual can pursue compensation for their losses.
Calculating damages (the financial compensation for your tangible and intangible losses) can be complex. In addition to paying for your medical bills, lost wages, and any loss of earning capacity, damages can cover trauma, pain and suffering, loss of consortium, or more.
Additionally, damage amounts can depend on who harmed you. For example, some state laws limit recoveries from municipal governments. A New Ulm personal injury lawyer can help you explore potential damages available in your case.
Personal injury law covers almost any type of harm to a person caused by someone else’s negligent or deliberate actions. However, certain types of personal injuries are more common than others, including the following:
To be negligent, a person must owe a duty of care to another. This duty can exist from a personal and individual relationship, like a doctor-patient relationship. It can also be broader, such as a driver’s duty to others on the road.
Once an injured person can demonstrate the wrongdoer owed a duty to them, they must prove that they breached that duty of care. Factfinders look at the reasonable person standard to determine whether someone has breached their duty of care. In other words, would a reasonable individual in the same position have acted similarly? If one can establish a breach of the standard of care, the injured party must show the breach caused losses that translate to legal damages, something a New Ulm personal injury attorney can further explain.
Damages are designed to make someone whole, which means returning them to the position that they were in before the accident. For example, if someone hits your car and breaks your leg, the economic damages can cover the cost of repairing your property and treating physical harm, in addition to any associated financial losses related to the claim.
However, damages cannot always completely reverse the losses you sustain in an accident. Even if the medical bills are covered for a broken leg, you may still have permanent physical limitations. For those instances, you can pursue non-economic damages.
These damages are for non-financial harms, also known as intangible harms. Non-economic damages can include damages for losses like pain and suffering, emotional trauma, and loss of consortium.
Punitive damages exist to punish the wrongdoer and discourage others from engaging in similar behavior. These damages are not always available—a wrongdoer’s behavior generally must be egregious to justify them. Some situations where punitive damages may be awarded include a drunk driving accident or a physical assault. A personal injury lawyer in New Ulm can review your case and help calculate a fair damages award.
If you have been harmed by someone else’s negligent or reckless behavior, a personal injury claim is one way to make you whole. These claims can help you recover damages for the tangible and intangible harms you suffered.
To learn more about filing a claim, schedule a meeting with a New Ulm personal injury lawyer today.
