How Serious Does an Injury Have to Be to File a Florida Personal Injury Case?

While most personal injury cases are settled long before they reach the courts, Florida has a large volume of these types of cases, and they remain a major portion of the judicial caseload. In light of this overload, Florida law requires that victims of a motor vehicle accident meet certain qualifications, or an injury threshold, before they are eligible to file a personal injury suit against the driver of the other vehicle.

Florida requires that drivers carry $10,000 in personal injury coverage. The purpose of this coverage is to ensure that the medical expenses following a motor vehicle accident are covered financially. As the primary insurance, this sum secures the coverage of all medical expenses up to the limits of the selected policy through the no-fault insurer. In addition, it also reimburses for other out-of-pocket expenses such as child care, or for resulting expenses such as lost wages.

Due to the no-fault insurance laws in the state of Florida, it is assumed that a no-fault policy will cover most to all financial setbacks following a motor vehicle accident. On this premise, any further financial recovery must fall under the umbrella of pain and suffering. Florida law stipulates that certain medical qualifications be met in order to be eligible for pain and suffering damages. According to Florida’s 2019 Statutes, these qualifications include significant or permanent loss of an important bodily function and permanent injury within a reasonable degree of medical probability, other than scarring or disfigurement. Also specified are the significant and permanent scarring or disfigurement, or death.

Without more specific guidelines written into the Florida statutes, it can be difficult to ascertain certain nuances within the law. However, specific cases and past court decisions can shed some light on this matter, giving a better idea as to which injuries may or may not meet the required threshold. Florida law allows for some ambiguity, as the same injury may affect different individuals in different ways, requiring something other than a hard-and-fast rule on the matter.

Should a trained 24-year-old boxer, for example, experience a motor vehicle accident, it’s conceivable that he may not even get whiplash injuries. However, should a pregnant woman experience the same incident, she is in a much more susceptible situation and is likely to endure a lot more trauma from the force of the impact, or even because of the way the seatbelt crosses her unborn child. In these two scenarios, it’s far more likely for the pregnant mother to meet the threshold required by the law than it is for the athlete to do so.

Alpizar Law is available to aid their clients in determining whether or not they meet the threshold required by Florida law to recover damages in relation to their motor vehicle accident. The Brevard County attorneys have the experience and expertise to fight for the compensation that the members of their community are entitled to. A local law firm, the team at Alpizar Law cares for their local clientele, and takes pride in providing the legal services required in personal injury litigation to their local community. With 65+ years of combined experience, the expert team of attorneys has successfully recovered hundreds of millions of dollars in damages on behalf of their clients.

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