The Most Common Types of Personal Injury

The term "personal injury" encompasses a wide variety of accident types. Yet, certain injuries tend to attract personal injury claims more frequently than others, partly due to their serious nature and partly due to the medical expenses incurred and wages lost by victims and their families. Here are some of the most commonly litigated injuries:



Traffic Accidents

The CDC reports [http://www.cdc.gov/VitalSigns/SeatBeltUse/LatestFindings.html] that, in 2009, traffic accidents sent more than 2.3 million adults to hospital emergency rooms for treatment. In a single year, these injuries and related deaths cost $70 million in medical costs and lost employment. This situation has created an atmosphere that's ripe for lawsuits, as victims claim the remuneration they feel is due them from the responsible motorists.

Workplace Injuries

According to the Bureau of Labor Statistics [http://www.bls.gov/news.release/osh.nr0.htm/], 3.1 million non-fatal workplace illnesses and injuries were reported in 2010, a number that represented about 3.5 workers in 100, or 3.5%. Work-related injuries often involve Worker's Compensation claims. Among those that don't, however, many workers decide, as they live from day to day with their injury or illness, that seeking legal redress is their only sensible option.

Slip-and-Fall Accidents

Slip, trip, and fall accidents are common and can happen almost anywhere, including at home, at work, at a neighbor's house, while frequenting a business establishment, and outdoors. According to the CDC, over a million Americans injure themselves in a slip, trip, or fall accident every year, with 12% to 15% of those ending up as Workers' Compensation cases.

Assaults

While intentional harm caused by physical assault is a crime, it often involves a civil suit for damages, medical costs, and other forms of compensation to the injured party as well. While recent case law has also seen a significant number of cases where criminals injured during the perpetration of a crime have initiated lawsuits against their victims who exercised their right of self-defense, this is, thankfully, not extremely common.

Unsafe Products

Everything from food-borne illness and pharmaceutical product contamination to defective toys, furniture, cars, and other machinery result not only in the massive number of product recalls we experience each year but also in the significant quantity of legal claims today's manufacturers routinely fight or settle out of court. The number of illnesses, injuries, and deaths resulting from unsafe products would be impossible to calculate, but one clue to the huge numbers of people affected is the incredible frequency of class-action lawsuits in these personal injury categories.

Industrial Illnesses

Many legal claims - often in the form of class-action suits - result from the long-term effects of exposure to toxic, carcinogenic, or otherwise-harmful substances in the work environment. Asbestos exposure is a good example, though many industries expose workers to a variety of other potentially harmful substances. Worker's Compensation handles many such cases, though lasting effects can lead to legal action even years after exposure.

Animal Bites

According to the CDC, dog bites cause 4.7 million injuries per year [http://www.marylandinjurylawyerblog.com/2012/05/dog_bite_lawsuit_statistics.html] in America, with more than half involving the victim's face. Thousands of mail carriers contend with dog-bite injuries each year, and many children are seriously injured - or even killed - after being mauled by dogs. Children are 900 times more likely than are letter carriers to be bit by a dog. Dog bite victims are estimated to suffer over $1 billion in damages each year, with 800,000 victims seeking medical attention for their injuries. These and other animal-bite cases leave careless pet owners subject to liability.

Medical Malpractice

Claims for medical malpractice - which often include medical misdiagnosis but can also result from poorly performed medical procedures or irresponsible treatment plans - are fairly widespread. Dental malpractice, a related area of contention that has litigants holding dentists responsible for poor dental outcomes, also fits this broad personal injury category.

Victims Fight Back

In our society, the potential for personal injury is great. It resides in multiple places and affects us in a multitude of ways. In the face of this very real threat, many victims and their families have empowered themselves to fight back by embracing their right to initiate legal action to recover the costs they face and mitigate the losses they've suffered.


Author Bio:
Liz contributed this blog post for Henry Carus & Associates. Liz is a freelance legal writer. She enjoys de-coding the finer points of complex laws so as anybody can understand it.