Motorcycle Accident Lawyer
Safety features in cars, including seatbelts and airbags, provide protection against injuries in certain kinds of collisions. Motorcycle riders have no comparable protection. They depend on a helmet and clothing to act as a safeguard against head injuries and road rash. Unfortunately, even the best gear can do little to prevent painful injuries in a motorcycle accident.
When motorcycle riders are injured because of another person’s carelessness, they are entitled to pursue compensation. The largest component of most settlements compensates injured motorcyclists for their pain, suffering, and emotional distress.
Compensation for Georgia Motorcycle Accidents
Georgia law endeavors to make accident victims whole. It does so by requiring the people who caused the injuries to compensate accident victims for their losses.
Substantial motorcycle accident injuries lead to substantial medical bills. Some riders have health insurance that will help them pay those bills. Others are uninsured. Even when motorcyclists have health insurance, however, they are billed for co-pay and deductible expenses that their policies do not cover.
Compensation reimburses motorcycle riders for their medical expenses. It also assures that they will be able to pay for future medical care that they will likely need. In addition, compensation covers the expense of coping with disabling injuries. For example, compensation may pay for wheelchairs as well as the cost of making a home wheelchair accessible.
When injuries prevent a motorcycle accident victim from working, compensation reimburses lost wages. If a disabling injury will reduce the victim’s ability to earn income, compensation should cover that lost earning capacity.
While those categories of compensation address economic losses, Georgia law also recognizes that accident injuries cause emotional losses. Compensation for pain, suffering, and emotional distress addresses those intangible losses.
Compensation for Pain and Suffering Caused by Georgia Motorcycle Accidents
While pain, suffering, and emotional distress are not tangible, they are undeniable consequences of accident injuries. Road rash, broken bones, and torn muscles cause intense pain. Motorcycle accident injuries often lead to long-term impairments that cause lasting pain.
Physical pain and disabilities produce emotional pain. The inability to lift a child, to play a sport, or to continue riding a motorcycle can be emotionally devastating. The inability to work after an accident impairs self-esteem. Motorcycle accident victims often suffer from depression or post-traumatic stress as a result of their injuries.
Georgia law recognizes that pain, suffering, and emotional distress deserve compensation. Accident victims cannot be made whole without that compensation. While money does not make pain go away, compensation helps to offset pain by improving the quality of the accident victim’s life.
Compensation contributes to emotional security by relieving disabled accident victims from the worry that they will not have the financial resources to cope with their disabilities. When activities like mowing the lawn would aggravate pain, compensation allows victims to avoid pain by hiring a landscaping service. Compensation can therefore be used to ease stress and make pain more tolerable.
Measuring Compensation for Pain and Suffering from Georgia Motorcycle Accidents
While financial losses can be measured, there is no formula for calculating the compensation that should be paid for pain and suffering. Pain affects every person differently. Some motorcycle accident victims cope with emotional distress more readily than others.
A motorcycle accident lawyer can rely on their knowledge and experience to place a value on pain and suffering. They keep track of the verdicts that local juries award in motorcycle accident cases. They compare a client’s pain to the pain described by other victims in injury trials. That knowledge creates a baseline that lawyers use to measure the compensation a motorcycle accident should receive for pain, suffering, and emotional distress.
