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• Personal Injury Law

• • Overview

  Put Simply...

  Personal Injury and its related area, Clinical Negligence, involves helping clients gain compensation for injuries suffered in accidents, at home or outside, and injuries inflicted on account of negligence by medical practitioners.
  
  As a solicitor, one can opt for becoming a claimants’ or a defendants’ lawyer, if interested in being at the receiving end. While most cases involving PersonaI Injury and Clinical Negligence will be from single individuals, in cases it could include a group of similarly affected people.

  What is involved in Personal Injury Law?

  While claimants’ lawyers act on behalf of injured parties, a defendants’ solicitor will operate on behalf of the party accused of causing or exacerbating the injury suffered. Most defendants carry malpractice or accident insurance. As a result, in a suit filed for PersonaI Injury, the insurance company or carrier also becomes a defendant in the proceedings. Entities that can be sued for damages for PI/CN can include local municipal authorities, employers for accidents in the workplace, or on account of a breach in health and safety regulations.
  
  Doctors and other medical practitioners in both public and private domains, hospitals, healthcare companies and pharmaceutical companies for wrongful death or injury from medical products insufficiently tested or marketed despite harmful and debilitating side effects can also be in the firing line. A claimants’ lawyers will begin with collecting and verifying complete details of the claim filed, document the injuries received, expenses incurred as a result of the latter and extrapolate time and earnings lost on account of the injury and calculate compensation/damages due to the claimant.
  
  They will check medical reports and make provisions for further checks where required, to ascertain and support facts of the case. Defendants’ lawyers try to reduce liability and compensation due from their clients and looking into the claimant’s culpability during the accident. They aim to reduce the amount of compensation to be paid out to as little as possible, whether through a settlement or in the course of court proceedings.

  What is needed for Personal Injury Law?

  The job first and foremost requires exceptional people management skills, especially when dealing with class action suits where each claimant may be pursuing his/her own agendas. People from all strata in society will form the core bulk of your practice, therefore it is essential that you are empathetic, show genuine interest in resolving their problems and have an impressive amount of patience.
  
  Practising as a PI/CN lawyer also involves being current with legislation and regulations in force, a thorough knowledge of medical matters and the ability to pick up complexities which arise with such claims. Creative thinking and first-class communication and negotiation skills are an absolute must. On the technical side, a comprehensive understanding of insurance law, professional negligence and malpractice liability are extremely critical.
  
  

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