Personal Injury Blog Articles

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Personal Injury Calculator

The personal injury settlement calculator is a simple software that is availabgle online. The personla settlement claculator is basically used to calculate an estimate of the compensation that you wish to claim. The personal injury settlement calculator is  programmed by taking into consideration the laws and applicable enactments. The calculator gives an estimate by taking into consideration the following factors:

- Type of injury

- Wages lost

- Total medical expenses

- Anticipated medical expenses

- Financial Losses

- Accounts for physical and mental trauma

There are several more factors that the court takes into consideration while giving a verdict. There is a standard formula that is many a times applied in order to derive the compensation.

Personal injury settlement= (special damages) * (percentage/scale prescribed by court) + (income lost) + (medical bills and other expenses)

The percentage that is prescribed by the court is derived on the basis of the scale of injuries.

The question how to use personal injury settlement calculator is commonly asked by many people. In order to use the calculator, all you need to do is fill up the applicable elements and click the 'calculate' button. The calculator will give you an estimated figure for the settlement. One must bear in mind that the figure is never exact as the court may reject some settlement claims.

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When A Little Car Accident Can Cause A Lot of Pain

Posted March 29, 2010

Years ago I miraculously survived a serious car wreck.  The pictures of the vehicle were scary and my car was totaled.  Yet, despite this major damage, my actual bodily injuries were minor, considering the severity of the vehicle damage.  Conversely, there have been wrecks with little to no vehicle damage, yet the person experienced lifelong bodily injuries.  How do we explain when a person is involved in what appears to be a low speed impact, yet is still suffering from pain? Whether or not there is vehicle damage does not necessarily determine the extent of injuries that one can suffer. There is considerable misconception about the amount of vehicle crash damage is directly related to the degree of occupant injury. Even minor car damage can major occupant injury and the injuries can be quite serious.

Plastic vs Elastic Deformation

Most people would expect that more injury will occur when the speed of the collision is greater. The truth is that this is the case sometimes especially when collisions occur at highway speeds. But in most cases even when the speed of a vehicle is very slow, with little or no damage, it can create a lot of pain. To understand this, we must understand the relationship between plastic and elastic deformity. When sufficient load is applied to a metal or other structural material like a car, it will cause the material to change shape. This change in shape is called deformation. <!--[endif]-->

What happens when we hit something plastic vs something elastic? If you hit something plastic , most likely it will break or dent. In plastic deformity, there is more deformity to the car. With plastic deformity there is more metal crushing or more damage to the vehicle, the G Forces associated with the crash are absorbed by the crushing metal, which in turn exerts less g forces to the contents of the vehicle (you)- therefore less injury.

A temporary shape change that is self-reversing after the force is removed, so that the object returns to its original shape, is called elastic deformation. If you look at a vehicle that is stiffer, with less vehicle damage, the energy is not absorbed by crushing metal (elastic deformity), meaning that the occupants will be more jostled and thrown around to a greater amount. In this case more g-forces are exerted and there is a greater change of injury.vs elastic which will bounce back to its original shape. In elastic deformity there is less damage. <!--[endif]-->

The Mathematics of Acceleration

Acceleration and Crush Distance can equal major injuries. In an automobile crash, acceleration is inversely related to how long the car moves before it comes to a stop (the crush distance).

a = V2/2s

where a=acceleration, V=velocity of impact, s=the Crush Distance.

Let’s look at 2 car collision scenarios: <!--[endif]-->

   1. A car hits a brick wall at 10mph and crushes the front of the car 5 inches.

      A=78.3 m/sec2, or 8 GS of Force

   2. A car hits a brick wall at 10mph. This car has a different car design and crushes the front of the car only 2 inches.

      A=196m/sec2, or 30G’s of force.

As you can see, we have a collision with the same velocity, but with a different crush distance smaller by 2.5 times, will have a resulting G force 2.5 times larger! <!--[endif]-->

Sometimes no serious visual deformation may occur on a vehicle even though it is subjected to relatively high speeds of impact. Often times motor vehicle bodies or bumper to bumper chassis give little or no crushing effect. Thus relatively high G forces can result in a whiplash injury. The use of stiff motor vehicle bodies and chassis will also produce a spiked G force loading to those in the car, even if little damage occurs to vehicle body or the frame of the car. So as you can see, even minor collisions can result in injury.

Injuries that can Result from car accidents