No matter under what circumstances you have sustained a sprain injury, in order to make claims for sprain injury compensation in Ireland, the accident in which you sustained the injury must be as a consequence of the carelessness of somebody who owed you a reasonable duty of care. This does not mean that person must have physically caused the accident at the time of your sprain injury in order to claim compensation for a sprain injury – just that their carelessness was the reason why your sprain injury occurred.
Often, it may not even be a single person against whom a sprain injury claim for compensation is made. Compensation claims for sprain injuries can be made against corporate bodies, local councils and State agencies who have failed in their duty of care to protect you from foreseeable risks and, once it is established that the incident in which your sprain was injured could have been prevented had greater care been taken by one of these “third parties”, you will be eligible to make a claim for receiving a sprain and recover compensation for your injury.
Supporting a Sprain Injury Claim for Compensation
If you were able to gather evidence of negligence after the incident in which you sustained your sprain, it can be used to support a sprain injury claim for compensation – provided that you did not risk deterioration of your injuries in order to obtain it. What evidence of negligence you should gather can contrast greatly depending on the nature of the incident in which you suffered a sprain injury, and can include photographs taken on a mobile phone at the time of an accident, the contact details of people who had seen your accident occur or physical evidence – such as when faulty products purchased from a shop have been the cause of your sprain.
If you could not collect evidence of negligence due to being incapacitated by your sprain injury, or because you wisely chose seeking medical attention for your sprain injury your priority, it may still be possible after the event to collect evidence in support of compensation claims for sprain injuries from:-
- The Health and Safety Authority if your sprain injury occurred at work,
- CCTV video if your sustained your sprain in a trip in the street or a slip in a shop, or
- The Gardai if your sprain was sustained in a road traffic accident.
In the majority of scenarios in which you may sustain a sprain injury it should be possible to recover some evidence of negligence in support of a claim for receiving a sprain. If you are unable to gather evidence yourself because of your sprain injury, ask a family member or friend (or a solicitor) to perform the action on your behalf as soon as possible – while the evidence you need to verify your claim for sprain injury compensation is still available and before the memories of witnesses begin to fade.
Making Compensation Claims for Sprain Injuries
The process for making compensation claims for sprain injuries in Ireland is to submit an application for assessment to the Injuries Board. This can be done using a hard copy of the Assessment Form A or by making your application for the assessment of compensation for a sprain injury online (except in the case of sprain injury compensation claims for children). Your assessment application should include your doctor´s medical assessment of your sprain injury (Assessment Form B) and receipts for any financial expenses you are seeking.
Once the Injuries Board Ireland receives consent from the negligent party to proceed with an assessment, you may be required to partake in a further medical examination to ascertain the extent of your sprain injury – after which the Injuries Board will issue a “Notice of Assessment” instructing you and the negligent party of how much they have assessed your claim for receiving a sprain for. If both you and the negligent party consent with the Injuries Board´s assessment of your sprain injury claim for compensation, an “Order to Pay” is provided and your claim will be settled by the negligent party´s insurance company.
Compensation Claim for Receiving a Sprain: Summary
No two compensation claims for sprain injuries in Ireland are the same – no matter how similar the details of the accident were – and it is always in your best interests to discuss your accident and sprain injury with a solicitor at the first available moment. A solicitor will be able to help with potential issues such as determining liability for your sprain injury, collecting evidence of negligence on your behalf and ensuring that your application for the assessment of sprain injury compensation to the Injuries Board accurately reflects the consequences that your injured sprain have made to your quality of life.
A sprain injury can often be a debilitating experience, and although no amount of compensation for a sprain injury can ever make up for the negligence of the person who was to blame for your injury, it costs nothing to find out whether you have a sprain injury claim for compensation which it is worth your while to pursue. Therefore, it is recommended that you discuss your eligibility to make a compensation claim for receiving a sprain with a solicitor at the first available opportunity.