Damages in Traumatic Brain Injury Cases

Brain injuries can change the life of an accident victim forever. You may be concerned about recovering the best settlement or award of damages in a brain injury case. It is important to discuss your lawsuit with a skillful Syracuse brain injury attorney. Our firm, DeFrancisco & Falgiatano, is well-regarded by insurance adjustors, defense counsel, judges, and organizations such as the Million Dollar Advocates Forum, to which only 1% of counsel across American belong. We understand how to present a case to both an adjustor and the court in order to obtain the best damages in traumatic brain injury cases.

Traumatic brain injuries can be catastrophic and can result in substantial losses for both an individual and his or her family. In most cases, accident victims must either slow down in their career path or quit working altogether. Damages in an accident case arising out of negligence are likely to be compensatory; in other words, these are damages intended to make up for your losses, rather than to punish the person who caused your injuries. However, when brain injuries are severe, damages may be six figures or more.

It can be tempting to take the first offer you’re extended if only to be able to pay sizeable medical bills out of the gate. However, you shouldn’t to try to rush to secure a settlement or to sign one without first talking to a lawyer of your own. A doctor or hospital’s legal counsel is not on your side. And it may not be immediately apparent how much and in what ways you have been impaired by a brain injury. Sometimes it takes one or more years to figure out the extent to which the brain injuries will limit your ability to work, participate in recreational activities and enjoy life over the long-term.

It may be necessary for us to retain a neuropsychologist or neuropsychiatrist who can administer tests to form a treatment plan and set of recommendations. Sometimes it is necessary to present expert opinions on medical care and rehabilitation.

Our firm will interview you to figure out the full scope of your losses. These can include consideration of how you feel physically as a result of the accident, as well as specific emotional difficulties engendered specifically by your brain injuries such as anxiety, depression, insomnia, mood swings, anguish, attention, and concentration troubles. Any of these may require medical care that the party responsible for your brain injuries should pay.

Intangible losses can be devastating to an accident victim and her family. One such loss is lost earning capacity. Brain injuries can result in difficulties focusing and fatigue, which can result in career loss. You may need to take an early retirement or take a lower paying job.

We will need to retain a vocational expert to estimate and testify about how much of your earnings you will lose because of your injury. Typically, an expert will look at what you’ve lose every year for a specified number of next years.

If you suffer a serious traumatic brain injury, you may need medication and physical therapy, along with caregiving, for the rest of your life. We may need to retain an expert about the parameters and estimated costs of reasonably necessary future care you may need. In some cases, a family member can attend to an accident victim’s needs, but sometimes it is necessary to retain the services of a paid caregiver. Assuming we can establish liability, we can recover not only the past and current costs of this caregiving, but also future needs.

When an accident victim experiences pain and suffering due to a traumatic injury, which is a common occurrence, it may be appropriate for us to retain an expert who can use economic factors to demonstrate to an adjustor or jury that your quality of life was reduced because of the injury.

In addition to costs and expenses, we may need to front the fees for independent medical examiners, experts for other technical issues such as an economist to estimate an accident victim’s losses, as well as deposition, court, and medical records costs.

If you suffered brain injuries due to negligence in Upstate New York, you should call the seasoned Syracuse serious injuries attorneys of DeFrancisco & Falgiatano. We strive to provide the best representation possible to clients in Lowville, Rochester, Auburn, Watertown, Herkimer, Oswego, Wampsville, Canandaigua, Lyons, Ithaca, Cooperstown, Oneida, Utica, Binghamton, and Elmira. Complete our online form or call us at 833-200-2000 for a free consultation.