When you’ve been in any sort of accident, you’ll have both calculable and incalculable damages to factor into your desired settlement amount. These general damages include your pain and suffering or mental anguish damages, and they aren’t backed up in quite the same way as your “special” or calculable damages. While you might have paper copies of medical bills with settled amounts on them or pay stubs that prove your typical weekly wages, there is no backup document that shows how much mental anguish or pain you’ve been going through.

Pain and suffering is one of the most common non-economic damages sought after following a Southwest Florida personal injury accident. Pain and suffering includes both the physical and mental pain experienced after your accident, and this can be tricky to calculate accurately without a concrete number you can assign to it. The best way to calculate a fair pain and suffering amount is to seek the help of a skilled personal injury attorney working in the Southwest Florida region. Discomfort, aches, medical recovery, anxiety, and any other types of pain felt can all be factored in to your pain and suffering amount.

What Factors Are Considered Under Pain And Suffering?

A great way to break down your pain and suffering amount is to consider what factors are brought into the equation. Some common factors considered when calculating pain and suffering are:

• Required medical treatment – Different medical treatments are needed for different experiences. For instance, a person who breaks their wrist and requires a quick setting and cast will have a much different experience than an individual who needs extensive wrist surgery to get their healing process underway. Typically, the more intensive the treatment plan is, the more it can be factored into your pain and suffering amount. An individual who now requires the assistance of a medical device or surgery will be able to factor more into their pain and suffering than an individual who required only pain medication and a splint.

• The severity of your injury – Recovering from a broken finger or a few stitches is far less traumatizing than recovering from a fractured vertebrae or widespread burns. The higher the severity of the injury, the more it can be factored into one’s pain and suffering amount. For those with particularly severe ongoing injuries, like traumatic brain injuries, pain and suffering settlements can grow quite large very quickly.

• Life impact – For a runner, a broken leg will be life-altering. For an individual with a background in construction, a back or neck injury can drastically change the way they work. The impact the injury has on your life will be a very important factor in your pain and suffering settlement. For personal injury cases where an individual’s injury is permanently life-altering, pain and suffering settlement amounts can be considered fair and appropriate all the way into the millions.

Proving Your Pain And Suffering

Proving your pain and suffering can be challenging in many cases as it doesn’t involve concrete numbers that can be backed up by bills, pay stubs, or receipts. However, there are pieces of evidence you can use to prove that the value you’re looking for is appropriate.

Written statements from mental health professionals, video diaries of a day in your post-accident life, prescription histories, and statements from medical doctors can all serve as valuable proof. Your personal injury attorney can assist you in collecting the right evidence to give you your best chance at a fair settlement.