The Impact A Personal Injury Claim Can Have On Family Members
Life changing personal injuries are one of the worst an individual can suffer. Severe personal injuries can cause trauma, mobility issues and life changing medical support for the rest of the victim’s life.
However, personal injuries not only affect the victim, but the accident itself has a ripple effect that affects family members and loved ones too.
Care and assistance:
After a severe injury, family members take responsibility as being the primary care provider. This involves helping their loved one perform activities of everyday living and help with their physical therapy tasks. This can affect family members who have not had any caregiving experience by not having the necessary knowledge if the care and assistance they are providing to their loved one is of adequate quality, even if acting in their best interest.
The types of care and assistance could include:
- Assisting with showering and bathing and personal care
- Help dressing
- Help with cooking and cleaning
- Shopping
- Driving.
Emotional Impact:
Family members will spend a time of grief as they discover the full extent of a loved one’s injury and seeing the extent of injuries can cause family members to experience an impact on their mental wellbeing such as stress and fatigue.
Family members may look to receive some emotional support from their GP or through charities. In cases where a child may have suffered a brain injury, charities such as the Child Brain Injury Trust can provide support to family members.
Financial Impact:
The financial impact a personal injury accident can cause is undeniable. Road traffic accidents causing a car to be written off, which disrupts the family’s main mode of transport for getting to work or helping children get to school causes a huge disturbance to the family.
Furthermore, the financial loss that can occur to the victim’s family by a loss of income and the inability for the victim to provide for the family due to sustaining life changing injury can cause serious financial instability towards the family, especially in situations where the victim in question was the main provider for the family, bringing even more stress into the family’s life.
Moreover, financial impact a personal injury can bring to family members is payment for care, assistance and medical aid illustrates further the impact a personal injury can have on family members, not only the person injured.
In these cases support may be required from the Citizen’s Advice Bureau, debt management or legal advice to ensure that families don’t suffer from debts alone.
In conclusion, personal injury not only affects the individual that suffers, it affects family members and loved ones too. This is why Hodge Jones & Allen will continue to help injured victims and offer support to family members and loved ones going through hardship and fight for what’s right! If you or a loved one has been injured, call our expert Personal Injury lawyers now on 0808 271 9413 or request a call back.
This blog has been written by Filip Murawski, Legal Clerk in our Personal Injury Team.
