Did you know that each year there are over thirty-five million injury-related visits to the emergency room? These unexpected medical bills can range from inconvenient to financially devastating depending on the nature of the injury. As such, you’re entitled to financial compensation if it was caused by someone.
Unfortunately, the legal proceedings for these personal injury claims can take quite a while. But, exactly how long does a personal injury case take? In this article, we’ll lay out a rough timeline of how most personal injury cases go. Let’s get started!
How Long Does a Personal Injury Case Take?
Unfortunately, there is no simple answer to the question. This is due to the complicated differences between certain types of personal injury cases. However, for the most part, personal injury cases do follow a general timeline. In this section, we’ll be walking you through what you can expect.
1. Accident Occurrence
This is the quickest phase of a personal injury case. It involves the single day when the accident happened and the injury occurred. It also includes an emergency room treatment.
2. Treatment Time
This includes the amount of time it takes to perform the recommended treatment options for your injury. The amount of time depends on your treatment options.
Conservative treatment, like chiropractors, can take between one and fifteen months. Aggressive treatment, like surgery, can take between two and six months.
3. Maximum Medical Improvement
Maximum medical improvement refers to the time length it takes for the maximum amount of improvement to occur. After this point, all other treatment options will simply result in a plateau.
Typically, this takes between six months to a year after your surgery.
4. Settlement Negotiations
Most personal injury cases are resolved in this phase. If a settlement is offered, then it will likely take place over one to two months of negotiations with an insurance adjuster. If no settlement is reached, then it will go to trial.
5. Lawsuit Phase
After the settlement negotiations and lawsuits are officially filed. It can take between one and three years for the trial to be seen by a judge and jury.
6. Appellate Phase
After a verdict in your favor is reached the case still isn’t officially over. The defendants still have the right to appeal the case. If this happens, then it can extend the personal injury case by another one to two years.
Want More Content? Keep Reading
We hope this article helped you answer the question, How long does a personal injury case take? As you can see, there’s no set answer to this question. That’s due to the variety of different factors that can lengthen or shorten your case.
As such, we recommend discussing the specifics of your case with a legal expert to get a more detailed response. Did you enjoy this article? If the answer is yes, then you’re in the right place. Keep exploring to find more topics you’re sure to love.