A grade 3 whiplash injury, which is characterized by neck pain and nerve damage associated with a spinal injury, is based on the scale adopted by the Quebec Task Force on Whiplash-Associated Disorders.
Settlements for a Grade 3 whiplash injury can run from $25,000 to $100,000.
At Stone Rose Law, we represent Arizona clients suffering from all forms of whiplash injuries. If you are suffering grade 3 whiplash after an accident where you were not at fault, call us at (480) 631-3025 or contact us online to speak with one of our experienced personal injury attorneys.
Symptoms common to a Grade 3 whiplash injury include neck injury pain combined with nerve damage symptoms related to spinal injuries like numbness or a tingling sensation in your arms or hands, weakness, headaches, vertigo, and tinnitus.
More severe whiplash injuries, like a Grade 3 injury, can significantly reduce your normal range of motion. They often involve muscle tearing and visible fibrotic scarring, possible injury to the ligaments supporting your spine, resulting in decreased or abnormal reflex responses.
MRI or CT scans may reveal the extent of Grade 3 whiplash nerve damage, herniated discs, or spinal stenosis. Grade 3 whiplash injury recovery often involves a longer recovery time compared to lower grades and can require up to a year or more of treatment, including but not limited to, physical therapy.
Most whiplash injury cases settle outside of court. Because of this, it is important to understand the factors that go into negotiating a settlement of a personal injury claim that is based on a whiplash injury.
The grade level severity of a Grade 3 whiplash injury is an important consideration because the more severe and detectable your symptoms are, the easier it is to prove your claim and damages. An important consideration with a Grade 3 whiplash injury is that it is easier to prove than lower grades because the underlying injuries are more readily detectable.
Medical expenses are a form of direct damages in a personal injury claim. These are tangible losses to you that can be compensated, like:
The presence of Grade 3 whiplash symptoms often means that the underlying accident was severe enough that whiplash may not be the only injury you suffer. In a serious car accident, for example, you can incur several other kinds of injuries like sprains and strains to other parts of your body like your back, shoulders, or limbs, lacerations, contusions, broken bones and fractures, internal organ injuries and internal bleeding, traumatic brain injuries, and burns. These potentially severe injuries will all factor into the overall value of your economic damages in addition to your whiplash injury.
In addition to economic damages, which are tangible, the same accident that gives you a Grade 3 whiplash injury can also result in non-economic damages claims for intangible harms you may suffer. These kinds of harm interfere with how you engage in work and daily life activities.
Examples of non-economic damages include physical pain and suffering, emotional distress, mental anguish, anxiety, depression (including claims for post-traumatic stress disorder, or PTSD), the inability to engage in social interactions and recreational activities, loss of enjoyment of companionship with your family, and loss of consortium with your spouse.
If you can return to work, but physical pain symptoms and reduced range of motion make you less productive, this reduced capacity can also factor into your settlement compensation claim.
In personal injury settlements, these kinds of non-economic damages are usually built into your overall compensation as a multiplier of your economic damages claims, or as a per diem amount multiplied by the number of days it is expected that your recovery will take.
For example, in a Grade 3 whiplash injury settlement, you may receive $30,000 in payment for economic damages and a multiple of 2 for your non-economic damages. In this case, your total settlement value would be $90,000, with $60,000 being twice the amount of your $30,000 in economic damages.
If the person or people you have personal liability claims against have minimal insurance coverage or no insurance coverage at all and few assets that can be liquidated to pay your damages, this can have an effect on how much you can realistically expect to receive in a settlement payout.
Your personal injury attorney who represents you in settlement negotiations will investigate the ability of the at-fault party, or parties, to pay, including whether they have insurance and how much their insurance coverage is, how fault might be allocated among multiple at-fault parties, and whether you may have an uninsured motorist coverage claim with your own insurer if you carry that coverage on your auto insurance policy.
Insurance companies and defense lawyers can raise several challenges to your whiplash injury settlement claim. These include casting doubt on the severity of your symptoms, especially subjective symptoms like pain and suffering, disagreeing on what kind of medical treatment you need and how much it should cost, and arguing that your symptoms are connected with an unrelated pre-existing injury or medical condition.
Also, in most personal injury cases, the at-fault party or parties will be looking for ways to claim that you were partly to blame for the accident and the harm you suffered. This is an affirmative defense strategy known in Arizona as “comparative negligence.”
Let’s say, for example, that in an auto accident, the defendant claims that you contributed to causing the accident because you were talking on the phone when it happened, and this distracted you. In a settlement or in court, this might lead to you being assigned a portion of fault based on a percentage. If this happens, then your recovery amount will be reduced by a percentage equal to your percentage of fault.
So, for example, if you were found to be 10% at fault by a jury or arbitrator and awarded you $30,000, this would be reduced to $27,000 ($3,000 being 10% of $30,000).
Overcoming these challenges typically requires a combination of thorough medical documentation, expert testimony, detailed accident reconstruction, and skilled legal representation. You must be ready for a potentially lengthy and complex negotiation process while your personal injury attorney engages with these challenges and defenses.
Not all whiplash injury compensation claims are alike, and neither are all Arizona personal injury attorneys. The quality of your legal representation will have a significant effect on the settlement you receive, or whether you will need to take your Grade 3 whiplash claims to trial.
At Stone Rose Law, our personal injury lawyers have the tough negotiating skills and trial court litigation experience to make insurance companies and defense lawyers take you seriously when it comes to getting the maximum compensation from the at-fault party who caused your whiplash injury. We do all of the following for our personal injury clients in Maricopa County and throughout the state of Arizona:
Get started today in settling your Grade 3 whiplash claims by calling one of our experienced personal injury attorneys at Stone Rose today, at (480) 631-3025. Or, if you prefer, use our online contact form to set up a free consultation to seek legal advice from one of our whiplash settlement lawyers.
