Workplace injuries and on-the-job accidents can leave victims unable to return to work. When this happens, you could be left with expensive medical bills and pain and suffering but no income to pay for them. It is vital to reach out to an experienced attorney for help getting the compensation you deserve.
Often, rules and restrictions dealing with insurance for injured workers can get in the way of full recovery, blocking compensation for pain and suffering. It is important to have a lawyer investigate your accident case and help you determine whether you could be entitled to a lawsuit to access additional damages.
For a free review of your potential work injury case, call The Carrion Law Firm’s work injury lawyers today. Our number is (718) 841-0083.
How to File a Work Injury Claim in Brentwood, Long Island
Many workers are unsure of how to proceed after an accident at work. You will first have to deal with the immediate effects and get emergency medical treatment for your accident, then you will have to deal with the long-term effects by seeking compensation for ongoing medical treatment, lost wages, and other damages. While insurance might be available to cover some of these damages, our work injury lawyers might be able to help you file lawsuits to get additional damages that this insurance does not cover.
Immediately after an accident, get medical care for any injuries you face. Your employer should be required to cover these emergency expenses. If not, we can fight to get these and other medical bills covered later as part of your lawsuit.
To get ongoing medical expenses and lost wages covered, many injured workers in New York believe they have to use Workers’ Compensation. While that system might be in place to cover exactly these sorts of damages, it often has restrictions and does not cover pain and suffering damages, leading to significant areas of compensation that injured workers miss out on. Our work injury attorneys might be able to file a lawsuit to help you get the rest of your damages.
If your injury was caused by a third-party defendant – i.e., someone other than your employer – you are not restricted from filing a lawsuit for damages. This means that roadside workers injured by a dangerous driver, contractors injured by negligent homeowners, workers injured by violent customers, and other work injury victims could be entitled to lawsuits for their work injuries. Many of these claims are filed against manufacturers of defective and dangerous products and equipment used in the workplace.
Lawsuits can also be filed against employers under certain circumstances. Our work injury attorneys can help you determine whether your accident falls under these circumstances or whether a lawsuit might be available on other grounds.
Damages Available for Injured Workers in Brentwood, NY
As mentioned, workers who rely on insurance often cannot claim full damages for their injuries. When our work injury lawyers say “full damages,” we mean the full value of all damages resulting from your accident. These are usually broken down into two main categories, but other damages might also be available:
Economic Damages
Economic damages include all damages that have a firm price or financial value attached to them. For example, injuries themselves do not have a price tag, but the medical expenses needed to treat those injuries do. Those medical bills are considered economic damages.
Most work injury cases involve both medical expenses and lost wages. Other economic damages that might arise in your case often involve property damage, the cost of household services you cannot perform, childcare needs during your recovery, and nearly anything else you must pay for because of the accident.
Non-Economic Damages
While economic damages involve compensation for expenses and costs you faced, non-economic damages involve compensation for the rest of the harms you suffered in the accident. The physical pain and mental suffering of an accident does not have a clear price attached to it, but our attorneys can nonetheless claim financial compensation for these harms. Many people use the umbrella term “pain and suffering” for all non-economic damages, but it is important to understand that this can also include things like mental anguish, emotional distress, embarrassment, discomfort, and other harms.
Calculating these damages often requires the help of an experienced attorney who has been involved with other injury cases and can use those experiences as a point of comparison to determine what your injury case is worth. Calculation methods often involve assigning a numerical score to your injuries, then multiplying your other damages by that number. Alternatively, a per diem rate can be assigned to your injuries and then multiplied by the number of days you experienced pain and suffering.
Talk to our work injury lawyers for help understanding what these damages are worth in your case.
Punitive Damages
Often, employers and businesses allow accidents to happen on their watch to a degree that is unacceptable in society. If your employer or any other defendant’s conduct was repeat or involved a disregard for the potential harm and injury their actions could cause, you could be entitled to punitive damages.
Punitive damages are not meant to compensate you for injuries like with economic and non-economic damages. Instead, these damages are an additional penalty that the defendant pays you to punish them for the harm they caused. Although these damages are rare, they are available in some cases of industrial accidents and other work injury claims.
Call Our Brentwood, NY Work Injury Attorneys Today
If you or a loved one was injured in an accident at work, call our work injury attorneys today. Contact The Carrion Law Firm for a free case review by calling (718) 841-0083.