Damages for Emotional or Psychological Injuries

If you are injured in an accident, one of the first things you will likely do is see your doctor to get treatment for your injuries. Physical injuries are often easy to see and might take the form of cuts, bruises or broken bones. By contrast, emotional or psychological injuries from an accident may not be so readily apparent and can sometimes take time to manifest.

A study published in 2018 found that individuals involved in car accidents are at increased risk for a variety of psychiatric disorders, and that post-traumatic stress disorder (“PTSD”) in particular can be a concern for people involved in motor vehicle accidents. Continue reading

Personal Injury Settlements: Things You Should Know

If you have been in an accident and are considering pursuing a claim against the person responsible for your injuries, you may be anticipating a courtroom trial. In reality, most lawsuits arising from accidents are resolved through settlement negotiations.

Settlements offer several advantages over proceeding to a trial. They result from a negotiation process, usually with the assistance of experienced legal counsel, after both parties have gathered all of the necessary evidence to allow them to assess the strength of their case. Below are answers to some commonly asked questions about accident claim settlements.

Why should I settle instead of going to court?

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Mitigation and Returning to Work After an Injury: What you Need to Know

Your duty to mitigate by returning to work

All personal injury plaintiffs are required to try and minimize their damages. This is called the duty to mitigate. Essentially, it means that even if someone else’s negligence caused your injuries, you have a responsibility to take all reasonable steps to heal from your injuries as best you can and to reduce any negative consequences from your injuries. If you could have taken reasonable actions to avoid or minimize a loss and you chose not to, damages for that loss will not be recoverable as our courts consider it unfair to make a defendant pay for losses that a plaintiff could have reasonably avoided. Continue reading

Pedestrian Injuries – Compensation for Injuries Suffered in Pedestrian-Motor Vehicle Collision

As winter settles in drivers contend with poor visibility and challenging driving conditions and pedestrian safety becomes a primary concern, especially for children and the elderly.

The heightened danger to child pedestrians results because they[i]:

  • are generally harder for drivers to see
  • may not understand how to cross the road safely
  • may have difficulty reacting to traffic (determining the direction of sound or judging distance or speed of oncoming vehicles)
  • cannot see out of the corners of their eyes as well as adults
  • may not realize that drivers are paying attention to other things, and not just them
  • may not understand that vehicles take longer to stop on wet or snowy roads

For older adults there may also be issues with hearing and sight as well as mobility challenges when crossing a roadway. Continue reading

School’s out! Summer Safety Reminders for Drivers, Parents, and Kids

Summer is well underway, and school is out for elementary, junior and senior high school age children. The summer means more kids on bikes, skateboards, and on foot (plugged into their smartphones). It also means an uptick in young people learning to drive. All of these things increase the potential for injuries to children. For drivers, this means you need to tune up your “kid radar” and drive defensively with a view to doing your part to ensure their safety and to protect yourself against liability.

In Alberta, ss. 185 and 186 of the Traffic Safety Act create a reverse presumption against drivers, such that if there is a collision between a motorist and a non-motorist (for example, a collision between a car and a child walking or on a bike), the onus is on the driver of the vehicle to prove that the accident did not arise solely because of their negligent operation of the vehicle. Continue reading

Credibility Part II: Video Surveillance

In a recent blog post, we discussed how credibility is key in personal injury actions. In this blog post, we explore this further by citing examples where a plaintiff’s credibility has been seriously compromised by video surveillance.

Video Surveillance and Privacy Rights

Video surveillance seems to be especially prevalent in cases involving claims for chronic pain because the reporting of chronic pain to medical professionals is often seen by insurance adjusters to be “subjective,” and thus subject to challenge. It is not uncommon for the defendant’s insurer to hire a private investigator to “tail” the plaintiff and video their daily activities in search of evidence that may compromise the plaintiff’s claims of impairment. Continue reading