Burn victims often survive their injuries, but burn injury survival means long hospital stays, several reconstructive surgeries, and potential lifelong medical treatment and care. Even first- and second-degree burn injury victims can face hundreds of thousands of dollars in medical expenses. Third-degree burn victims will likely face upwards of $1 million in medical costs and expenses to address not only healing and reconstruction of external wounds, but also psychological therapy and treatment of infections and internal organ damage.
A typical burn victim will experience critical, acute, and long-term rehabilitation phases while recovering from his injuries. The critical phase occurs immediately after occurrence of the injuries and focuses on stabilizing the burn victim, treating his pain and providing therapy to ally his fears over his injuries. Once stabilized, the burn victim’s medical team turns toward restoring his health and well-being with skin grafts and other treatments to bring his internal systems as close to fully functional as is possible. The burn victim’s long-term rehabilitation might last throughout the remainder of his life. If the burn victim suffered his injuries as a result of another party’s negligence, his attorney will seek to recover a monetary award that accounts for the full amount of his medical costs, lost wages, and pain and suffering through each of these three phases of the victim’s recovery.
A burn victim must generally file his negligence lawsuit within a set deadline that is established by the statute of limitations in his residence state. Most statutes of limitations require a victim to file his suit within four years of the date of the accident that caused his injuries. Some states have set a shorter statutory deadline for negligence cases that are filed against governmental entities. Failure to file a negligence lawsuit prior to the statutory deadline will preclude a burn victim from recovering any monetary award to compensate him for his injuries. The amount of time to file a negligence lawsuit might seem long, but a burn victim will likely be in therapy for an equally long time, and the filing deadline can approach very quickly. Moreover, memories of an accident can fade or get muddled over time. A burn victim’s best strategy is to file his negligence lawsuit as soon as is possible after the accident.
If you have suffered burn injuries in an accident that was caused by another party’s negligence, please contact us as soon as you can after the accident for advice and counsel on filing a lawsuit to recover the maximum damages award to compensate you for your injuries.