Top 6 Most Common Types of Personal Injury Cases

Posted On April 21, 2023

(Last Updated On: April 21, 2023)

Have you ever thought what are the most common types of personal injury cases? Actions can have unfavorable consequences, especially those that harm another person physically, emotionally, or mentally. Governments have passed laws to protect people from any harmful acts, both intentional and not. These are known as personal injury laws, and breaking it can have severe consequences.

Many people don’t realize they can sue someone who has caused them physical, emotional, or even mental harm. Knowing the grounds for personal injuries can help you seek justice, protection, or defense in legal battles.

What is Personal Injury Law?

According to the law, personal injury occurs when a person’s negligence, carelessness, or wrongful conduct impacts another person’s physical, emotional, or mental capacity.

Personal injury can be categorized into four primary types: accidents, intentional acts, defective products, and defamation. These categories of personal injury cause a physical, emotional, or mental impact on another person. Each category is as follows:

Accidents: Result from a negligent manner or careless action of one person harming another person, such as in the cases of car accidents and medical malpractice.
Intentional acts: These are considered personal injuries resulting from a person’s actions against another with the intention to harm the latter. An example of this is assault and battery.
Defective products: These may cause personal injury when products or equipment bought from a manufacturer or seller do not function effectively and harm another person.
Defamation: Another type of personal injury that covers any act that causes embarrassment or affects a person’s reputation.

6 Common Cases of Personal Injury

Personal injuries occur in various forms. But under these four primary types, there are six common personal injury cases.

1. Car accidents

Car accidents are common occurrences that typically happen when a driver does not follow traffic rules and regulations, resulting in collisions that can harm people and property.

The law deems the driver reckless or noncompliant with traffic rules and holds them accountable for all expenses from the accident they caused. These expenses can include medical costs for injuries or surgeries needed by the victims or burial expenses in case any person dies due to the accident.

2. Slips and falls

Slips and falls are also common accidents that occur in physical infrastructures. These infrastructures can be buildings for work, apartments, or other types of spaces where people usually navigate.

Whether this responsibility to safeguard the welfare of people in the building is in writing, owners of these infrastructures are accountable for ensuring the safety of people on the premises to avoid accidents, such as slips and falls.

In some cases, the legal repercussions and the liability of the building owner depend on the nature of the accident. These legal repercussions may also rely on the state’s existing laws or the infrastructure’s location.

3. Dog bites

Dog owners can be held liable for a dog-biting accident if the victim can prove the owner’s negligence in monitoring and securing their dog against harm towards a person.

The penalty for the dog owner may involve paying for the damages caused to the victim, such as medical expenses to treat the possibility of rabies infection. It may also vary depending on the laws and policies implemented in the location of the accident.

4. Assault, battery, and other intentional torts

Unlike other personal injuries causing physical harm to other people, cases of assault and battery occur when one person intentionally attacks or makes actions causing personal injuries to another person.

The attacker is often subjected to legal repercussions once proven guilty of the acts. In some cases, victims are given entitlements of financial settlement for the damages the attacker caused.

5. Medical malpractice

People often place their health and lives in the hands of medical practitioners. In turn, these medical practitioners spend many years in school and in practice to develop strict, professional, and, most importantly, proper treatment for people.

However, when a medical professional fails to provide correct or professional treatment or actions toward the case of a patient that leads to physical, emotional, and mental harm, this can be considered medical malpractice.

Under the law, getting a bad result or treatment doesn’t necessarily mean malpractice since, in some cases, part of the treatment and its effectiveness also rely on the patient’s compliance with medical orders.

But when the case proves that the medical professional relayed false information or mishandled the patient, that is deemed medical malpractice since it can damage a person’s physical and mental health and even lead to death.

6. Defamation

Defamation damages a person’s reputation, mainly if the information presented against a specific person is incorrect and is inherently intentional to create a negative perception of them.

Defamation is a personal injury since it can significantly impact a person’s emotional and mental well-being. This case of personal injury can either be libel or slander. Libel cases under the defamation category are typically based on written statements, while slander cases are oral.

Under the law, the person who made the defamatory statement can be liable for their action. The victim needs to prove that the comments about the person are false and provide the quantified cost of damages due to the defamatory statements.

This type of personal injury, when taken with legal actions, can be complicated in the case of celebrities and public figures since these people need to prove that the defamatory statement made against them was intentional or made with pure disregard for factual information.

With Knowledge Comes Justice and Protection

All these common types of personal injuries have legal consequences, depending on their severity. You need to know the grounds you can file for any of these personal injury cases or can be filed against you.

Knowing these grounds prepares you for the legal battle against someone who has harmed you or made false accusations against you. If your neighbor’s dog breaks loose and bites you, you accidentally slip on a puddle at the mall, or someone has been spreading rumors about you—you don’t need to sit still and simply bear the consequences. You can take action.

Knowing to seek justice, protection, or defense is particularly important for medical practitioners and professionals who rely on their licenses to practice. It’s even essential for ordinary individuals who initially lacked the legal knowledge of these needs and may be taken advantage of.

Top 6 Most Common Types of Personal Injury Cases

What is Personal Injury Law?