The biggest mistake a person can make in a personal injury case is to reach a settlement before it has been determined what the outcome of the injury itself is going to be. Until a doctor can determine that a client’s injuries will not require lifelong care, it is impossible to estimate what a fair settlement price would be, according to Philip Baddour at Baddour, Parker & Hine, PC, a personal injury law firm in Goldsboro, North Carolina.
The first thing that an attorney will want to determine is whether the client is going to get better or whether there is going to be permanency in the injury. A personal injury lawyer should not even be thinking about the settlement until the active treatment of the injury has been concluded, Baddour says.
Another key medical term in these types of situations is “maximum medical improvement,” which Baddour explains is a term that doctors and lawyers use to describe the point at which a doctor feels like the patient has gotten as good as he is going to be. It is at that point when the topic of a financial settlement is ready to be broached.
This is also the point when a physician can usually assign a permanent impairment rating, which can be used to determine a settlement amount. This rating should also give all of the parties involved some idea of the type of ongoing treatment that the injured person is going to need throughout his life, if any.
The cost of ongoing medical care is generally one of the biggest expenses in a personal injury case, which is why a settlement figure cannot be reached until the attorney can estimate how much that care is going to cost. It is also helpful to have an estimation of the likelihood that the patient will need further surgery in the future, since surgeries themselves can be quite costly.
In addition to the medical costs, any lost wages need to be taken into account as well. Although many people do go back to work before they reach maximum medical improvement, it is still important to figure in the amount of lost wages that the person suffered during hospital stays and subsequent recovery periods.
A personal injury lawyer needs to collect all of this information from the doctors and employers before he can even begin to come up with a figure that would be adequate to cover the lifelong expenses that his client is likely to face as a result of the injury. Only when an attorney has all of these figures in place can he begin to evaluate the case as a whole and take that first step in settling with the insurance carrier. If the insurance carrier agrees to accept the settlement offer and pay the full amount, then the case may be over fairly quickly. In many cases, however, personal injury settlements do take some time.
If the insurance carrier refuses to accept the initial settlement offer, then it may take nine to 12 months before the next chance to settle comes up during the mediated settlement conference. This is when a personal injury lawyer will sit down with the insurance company and a mediator to discuss the merits of the case. In general, the length of time that a personal injury case takes to settle will depend on its size, its significance, and the complexity of the litigation.
Of course, Baddour explains that there are times when a lawyer may make the strategic decision to go ahead and file the personal injury lawsuit even before the client has completed his medical treatment. That could be for various reasons, such as if the treatment is so long that the statute of limitations is likely to run out or if it looks like the liability is going to be contested. Essentially, Baddour explains that if it doesn’t look like the client has a reasonable chance of settling with the insurance company, then a lawyer should not delay filing in the case.
Instead, the attorney should file the suit and then begin the discovery process to show the insurance company that his case is a serious matter. Once the suit is filed, the insurance carrier will have the opportunity to file an answer with the court, usually within 60 days. Next comes the written discovery phase, the oral discovery phase, mediation, and then court - which is why it can sometimes take awhile for a personal injury case to come to a close.
This article is for informational purposes only. You should not rely on this article as a legal opinion on any specific facts or circumstances, and you should not act upon this information without seeking professional counsel. Publication of this article and your receipt of this article does not create an attorney-client relationship.
