If you’ve been injured in an accident, you can pursue financial compensation in a personal injury claim. Damages in a personal injury case include non-economic damages such as diminished quality of life. The injuries you suffer in an accident can have long-term consequences, sometimes keeping you from doing things you once loved. When this happens, you can seek compensation for reduced quality of life.
Quality of life falls within the category of pain and suffering that an accident victim can experience after the event. Physical, mental, and emotional trauma can all lead to quality of life issues and payment through a personal injury claim. To collect for quality of life in your case, a personal injury lawyer can help you document the issues you face and the effects of an injury on your enjoyment of life.
What Is Diminished Quality of Life?
Diminished quality of life, in a personal injury context, means the effects of your injuries on your well-being, physical and mental health, and ability to enjoy life.
For example, injuries from an accident might keep you from doing any of the following:
- Doing activities and hobbies you enjoyed doing previously
- Continuing to work and further your career
- Spending time with friends and family
- Preparing meals and taking care of yourself at home
- Inability to take care of children and other family members
- Traveling to and from places
- Acting independently as you were accustomed to before.
You might not realize it, but when the negligent actions of another person impact your quality of life, that person could be required to pay you financial compensation. Quality of life factors in an accident’s physical, mental, and emotional effects on your day-to-day activities. When you hear about “pain and suffering” in a personal injury case, quality of life also falls within that category of non-economic damages. These are the long-lasting costs of an accident that aren’t easily measured in dollars and cents.
An experienced Georgia personal injury lawyer will identify, estimate, and pursue damages for quality of life in your case.
How Is Quality of Life Calculated as Damages After an Accident?
Calculating damages when it comes to quality of life is not an exact science. However, experienced personal injury lawyers will use several factors to estimate the value of your damages in the quality of life category. Depending on the severity of the accident and injuries involved, many impacts on your life can be translated to monetary value in personal injury claims.
Some common ways injuries in a personal injury case can affect a person’s daily life might include:
- Inability to perform day-to-day activities like cooking, bathing, dressing, cleaning, leaving the house to take care of errands;
- Being unable to take care of your children, a spouse, or other family members;
- Suffering from chronic pain and distress;
- Inability to maintain hobbies, physical activities, sports, and other pastimes;
- Loss of companionship and society among friends, family, coworkers, and social groups;
- Inability to bear children or be intimate with a partner;
- Depression or anxiety due to disability, disfigurement, and scarring from the accident;
- General anxiety, emotional distress, and PTSD
There is no cut-and-dry formula for calculating how any of these factors play a role in your case. Your situation will be unique, and your lawyer will work with you to establish the monetary value connected to your change in quality of life. Often, lawyers will use a “multiplier” to estimate the worth of non-economic damages such as quality of life.
Using the multiplier method, your attorney will first calculate your economic damages – such as medical bills, lost wages, and property damage. This figure will then be multiplied by a number ranging between 1.5 and 5 in order to estimate non-economic damages. The more severe your quality of life impact, the higher this multiplier will be. An experienced personal injury lawyer will work to maximize the multiplier used in your case.
When Does an Accident Affect Quality of Life?
Not every accident will have a true impact on your quality of life. However, many accidents will impact your quality of life in one way or another. Serious accidents and those causing catastrophic injuries will almost always have an effect on your quality of life. Devastating injuries will have long-term impacts and can result in long-term or even permanent losses of function.
Injuries that can decrease an accident victim’s quality of life can include:
- Broken bones
- Injuries to internal organs
- Loss of hearing or vision
- Spinal cord injuries
- Traumatic brain injuries
- Burns
- Loss of limbs
- Paralysis
- Disfigurement.
Serious injuries can reduce a person’s enjoyment of life in many different ways. If you or a loved one were hurt in a serious accident, you have a legal right to seek damages from the negligent party that caused the accident.
A Georgia Personal Injury Lawyer Can Help if Your Quality of Life Was Affected in an Accident
If you or a loved one were injured in an accident in Georgia, you could be entitled to compensation in a personal injury claim. Damages can include not only your medical bills, lost wages, and other financial costs but also non-economic damages, including quality of life. If your enjoyment of life was affected by the accident, a personal injury attorney from The King Firm Car Accident and Personal Injury Lawyers will help hold the negligent party responsible. Contact us today and schedule your free consultation today at (229) 386-1376.