.png)
Recovering from a shoulder injury is expensive. Depending on what happened, the victim may even need surgery to repair the damage suffered. One of the most dangerous shoulder injuries people can get is a torn labrum.
Victims of an accident can get a torn labrum due to a sudden hit to their shoulder. When someone gets a shoulder injury from repetitive overhead motions, it's up to them to pay for everything. Things change when the problem comes from a third party.
Negligent parties for a shoulder injury can and should be held accountable for the damage they caused. In most cases, the victim will hire a personal injury lawyer to file a torn labrum claim. However, how much money can they actually get by doing that?
Anyone interested in learning the average settlement for a torn labrum claim will find all the answers they are looking for here. This page also shows additional information about this injury and its relation to personal injury law.
Larrimer & Larrimer is a law firm based in Columbus, Ohio. Victims of this problem should call it at (614) 820-1855 to get a free consultation for their case or for information on how to fire an workers comp attorney. There, they will find other personal injury blog posts.
What Is a Torn Labrum?
To know the average settlement for a torn labrum claim, it's important to understand what the injury consists of in the first place. The labrum is part of the cartilage that goes around the socket of a person's shoulder joint. This piece of cartilage keeps the shoulder in place by deepening the socket and giving stability to the upper arm bone.
The labrum is like a ring of cartilage, and a torn injury happens when it gets damaged or ripped. There are two types of labral tears:
Superior Labral Anterior to Posterior (SLAP) Lesion: SLAP lesions happen in the upper part of the labrum. It happens due to repetitive motions such as playing baseball or tennis. More specifically, throwing the ball in the former and serving in the latter.
Bankart Lesion: Bankart tears come from the front of the labrum. The cartilage stays attached to the bones of the socket there. Forceful dislocation of the shoulder is often the reason for this injury. Car accidents and falls can cause it.
How Do People Get This Shoulder Injury?
Just like the examples given before, many other things can cause this shoulder injury. The way in which it happens will also determine the type of tear the victim suffers and the treatment it will need to heal.
Throwing sports such as baseball, football, and softball are common causes of Bankart-type torn labrum injuries. That doesn't mean people will automatically develop this problem if they play them, though. This also happens with racquet sports such as tennis, squash, and badminton.
The problem comes when people unsafely play the sport every day without stretching properly. It's more common for professional players to suffer this problem than casual ones.
Although people often take it for granted, stretching is more important than most think. Weightlifting and gymnastics are often a common cause for shoulder injuries.
Now, someone looking to get compensation for a torn labrum can only get it if it happened due to the negligence of another party. Since accidents often cause a sudden hit to the victim and the people with them, that hit could dislocate their shoulder joint and tear their labrum.
Depending on how the accident develops, the injury could become worse. Some only require physical therapy, while others ask for surgical intervention. These are the accidents that are more likely to cause a shoulder injury:
Car Accidents
Car accidents can make victims suffer all kinds of injuries and even kill them, depending on how serious they are. When any kind of vehicle crashes with another person's car, the sudden and forceful movement could make them hit another part of the vehicle and cause a torn labrum.
People who suffer a torn labrum don't notice they got it right away. Anyone involved in a car accident should get medical assistance as soon as they can to get a diagnosis.
Slip and Fall Accidents
Slip and fall accidents could also cause damage to someone's shoulder socket. As their name suggests, it happens when the victim falls in a public or private place and gets shoulder labrum tears.
However, if this occurs when someone falls, why is it a personal injury case? Well, everything depends on the reason why the victim fell in the first place. When someone falls because of a slippery floor, they could ask for a fair settlement with a personal injury attorney.
In these cases, the property owner should have let visitors know of the slippery floor. Personal injury claims need to prove they didn't warn people about the dangers of being there.
Getting an injury this way shouldn't lead to overly expensive treatments such as shoulder surgery, but victims still deserve money for medical bills.
Workplace Injuries
Depending on where the victim works, they may be in danger of developing a workplace injury. This could be due to the negligence of another party that caused an accident or because employers made their workers perform unhealthy repetitive motions.
When someone suffers a posterior labrum tear while working, they can file a workers' comp claim to get coverage from an insurance company. Similar to claims from a personal injury attorney, victims can get money for their medical expenses and lost wages.
What Is the Average Settlement for a Torn Labrum Claim?
It's difficult to determine the average settlement for a torn labrum claim because, due to the complexity of this shoulder injury, the damages it causes can vary a lot. Many personal injury verdicts in Ohio surpass $300,000, but they could even get as low as $13,000.
The fact that the medical treatment needed to heal a torn labrum could go from physical therapy to surgery is what makes it so challenging to get an average. Needless to say, that "average" would be imprecise since not all torn labrum injuries are the same.
Other factors apart from medical treatment can make compensation higher. One of them is lost wages. Getting a labral tear will most likely keep the victim from working. Hence, the personal injury lawyer they hire can ask the other party for the money their client is unable to make due to the accident.
Victims can try to cover non-economic damages with a torn labrum injury claim. It's up to lawyers to prove how much money their client needs for the emotional distress and pain they went through.
That being said, the average settlement for personal injury cases, in general, is $300,000 or a bit more.
How Does Compensation Work with Torn Labrum Cases in Columbus, Ohio?
Compensation in labral tear cases is the same as it would be with any other serious injury. Victims can cover economic and non-economic damages and sue the negligent party for what happened for them to pay for everything.
Ohio uses a comparative negligence system, which allows people to get compensation for an accident even if they are partially at fault for it. However, the money they will get will be lower than the amount they would get if they were not liable for what happened.
If someone, for example, is in a car accident and found to be 30% at fault. They would only get 70% of the total cost of the damages they suffered. In this case, if that total amount is $10,000, they would receive $7,000.
Regardless of that, no one can get compensation in a shoulder injury case if they are more than 50% liable for the accident.
Now, here is a deeper explanation of the damages people can recover from a torn labrum injury case:
Economic Damages
Economic damages refer to anything people can give an exact price to. Medical bills are a perfect example of this. When the hospital tells the victim how much they need to pay for everything, they can directly ask for that amount of money in the labral tear claim.
Naturally, recovering from physical therapy is not as expensive as more intrusive medical procedures. That's the reason why it's difficult to get an average settlement for these cases.
Lost wages often confuse people since they don't quite get if they are economic or non-economic damages. Any kind of lost income, by definition, will always be part of the former.
It's important to keep in mind that economic damages include quantifiable financial losses that happen due to a serious injury. Objectively, lost wages are a measurable financial loss because people can calculate how much money they would have made if they had gone to work when they were recovering from the injury.
Non-Economic Damages
The fact that economic damages represent a measurable financial loss helps people understand the concept of non-economic ones. They are, in a nutshell, subjective and harder to quantify losses.
Non-economic damages try to give people compensation for intangible consequences of the accident, such as physical pain, anxiety, impact on marital relations, emotional distress, and other psychological problems. Since they are not things with an exact price in real life, it's difficult to give them a specific dollar value.
According to the Ohio Revised Code, there is a cap to non-economic damages. People have two ways to measure that limit. The first one is a cap of $250,000 regardless of anything else.
However, people could get more than that as long as it doesn't go beyond an amount higher than three times their economic losses. This has a limit of $350,000 per person and $500,000 for everyone involved in the accident.
It's easier to get it with an example:
In an accident where the medical bills are $10,000 and lost wages represent a $5,000 loss, the total economic damages amount is $15,000. Three times that would be $45,000, but the maximum for measuring the cap this way is $350,000.
Since the amount of getting three times the economic damages doesn't get to that limit, people need to try the lower option, which is $250,000. Therefore, that would be the cap for non-economic damages in this case.
How Can a Personal Injury Lawyer Help Your Case?
Hiring a personal injury lawyer is one of the most important steps to get compensation for an accident. They will build a legal strategy with the victim in a free consultation and then start gathering evidence for the case.
Many workers compensation attorneys in Columbus will also handle all the paperwork and negotiations needed to get the victims enough compensation for the damages they suffered. Although the settlement or court award depends on the severity of the injuries, it's also important to hire a lawyer who can prove the victim needs that money in the first place.
If the case goes to trial, they will also be the ones in charge of leading it. The same happens if they want to appeal the court's decision.
What Other Shoulder Joint Injuries Can People Get Compensation for?
This blog post is about labral tears, but that's not the only shoulder problem people can get compensation for after an accident. This is a list of other shoulder joint injuries people can get money for through a personal injury claim:
Shoulder dislocation
Shoulder impingement
Fractures
Final Thoughts - Get Legal Help in Columbus, Ohio
Regardless of the circumstances in which the accident happened, covering medical expenses is not affordable. Even in the best-case scenario, victims will most likely need to take a few weeks off to recover. That makes them lose money.
Although there is not an exact average settlement for a shoulder injury claim, victims should aim to get as much compensation money as they can. They can only do this with help from a professional and experienced lawyer.
Larrimer & Larrimer works in Columbus, Ohio, and is ready to help any victims seeking legal help. This law firm has lawyers ready to file a third-party lawsuit against the negligent party that caused the injuries the victim is suffering from.
Anyone looking forward to seeking financial help and justice for what happened should call it at (614) 820-1855 to schedule a free consultation with one of its legal experts. Its website has many other personal injury blog posts available, too.
Comments