How to Document Medical Costs After an Accident for Maximum Compensation

The reason it’s so important to document everything related to your medical costs is because your calculations need to be accurate for your claim to be strong. Beyond that, if you hope to make any claim for non-economic damages, such as pain and suffering, bear in mind that those damages will be calculated in relation to your economic damages, which are those that you can quantify with a bill or receipt. You cannot bring a claim only for pain and suffering or mental anguish. You must be able to prove that you had physical injuries and exactly the extent of these injuries, which is calculated primarily by looking at how much you’ve had to spend to treat them.

In most cases, the non-economic damages are calculated by multiplying your economic damages by a number between one and five. The more serious your injuries, the higher that number will be. And the more expensive your medical treatment, the bigger number you will get after making this calculation. If you have not properly documented some of your medical costs and they are left out of these calculations, not only will you not be reimbursed for your financial losses for the treatment, but you will not be able to get the proper calculation for your non-economic damages, either.

It’s never smart to try to do all this without a car accident lawyer’s help. A lawyer knows exactly what the courts are looking for in these situations and what kind of documentation they’re going to accept. Your lawyer also knows how to properly calculate the compensation using the documentation you’ve gathered.

But it’s not just a matter of having documentation, either. You also have to be able to put together all these documents and build a cohesive and compelling story out of them that shows what you’ve actually lost and suffered. And then, that story has to be told in a convincing way, both in negotiations with an insurance company and in the courtroom. Your lawyer has the experience and knowledge of the law to do all of this.

The first step is to properly identify what it is you’re looking for. You will need documents that show the name and address of every person or entity who you have paid, your health insurance company has paid, or who has sent you a bill that has not yet been paid. This means every doctor, hospital, medical center, physical therapy center, pharmacy, etc. These documents need to show the amount and date of each payment, if payment has already been made. If not, they need to show the amount being requested and, and you should divide these bills into those that have already been paid and those that are outstanding, if any are.

Everything should be documented very carefully. If you get a bill from the hospital, it’s a good idea to give them a call and ask them to send you an itemized bill. There are two good reasons for this. First, an itemized bill is harder for the insurance company to argue against. They can’t just say, “this seems unreasonably high.” Instead, they have to actually identify what items they are in disagreement with and explain why they think you didn’t need that treatment or why that treatment shouldn’t have cost as much as it did. Second, it’s well known that asking a hospital to send you an itemized bill almost always makes the bill “magically” go down. Once the hospital has to justify every number, it sometimes turns out that there’s been a bit of padding going on.

All these records also need to state clearly on them who received the care, the nature and purpose of each expense, and precisely who gave the care. You should also keep all correspondence that you’ve had with any healthcare professional, even if it’s not an official record or bill. This should include any emails, snail mail communications, texts, records of a telehealth conference, etc.

The next step is to keep your records secure and organized. If you are not already a highly organized person, talk to your lawyer about the best way to do this. In some cases, the thing to do may be to simply send everything, or at least a copy of everything, to your lawyer as soon as you get it. That way, you don’t have to worry about losing it. One thing you should never do is send the records directly to the insurance company without talking to your lawyer first. The insurance company that you’re negotiating with may request medical records, but your lawyer will decide what records should be sent to them and will protect you from any attempt on the part of the insurance company to access your medical history beyond what is relevant to the injury caused by the accident.

You also don’t want to send a record to the insurance company only to have it “disappear,” either because it’s lost in the mail or because the insurance company itself loses that document. It’s better to make sure that only copies are going out or that you retain a copy as the original gets sent on (if an original is required). Your lawyer may also need to file some of these documents as evidence with the court if your claim goes to trial. If you are keeping the records yourself, then you will want to make sure you have a separate place to keep all records that are specifically related to this accident. Even if you typically keep all your medical records at home, don’t keep these records in the same place. You’ll need to keep these separate so there’s no confusion between what should and should not be included in your claim. You also don’t want to have to spend a lot of time digging out your records from a pile that includes a number that are irrelevant to the case.

Get a filing cabinet or other system of organization and determine in advance how you will arrange your documentation. It’s best to keep bills, medical records, and correspondence in separate sections. You can then arrange them by dates, in alphabetical order, or in some other arrangement that makes sense to you and will make it possible for you to quickly find what you need if any of these documents are requested. It’s a smart idea to make a copy of every one of these documents before you put it into your filing cabinet.

For more help with your medical documentation and maximizing your compensation after a car accident, contact the Joe A. Gamez Law Firm, PLC in Houston, Dallas, San Antonio, Laredo, Austin, or McAllen, TX today.