In Texas, if you’ve been injured as a result of a car accident, or have sustained a personal injury in any other way due to someone else’s negligence, you have a legal duty to mitigate damages. In the following article, Houston car accident attorney Michael Grossman unravels this unique legal term so that you can have a better understanding of one of the legal duties that a victim must meet in the aftermath of a car accident.

Mitigating damages means that a victim must exercise a reasonable amount of care in getting their injuries looked after and cared for after they’ve incurred these injuries because of an auto accident or some other type of debilitating incident. As an example, suppose that a victim is in a car wreck and hurts his hand, but decides to “tough it out” and fails to see a doctor within the weeks following the accident. The hand injury grows worse, but the victim still fails to see a doctor. Finally, after more then a few weeks, the injured victim’s hand hurts so much that he then sees a doctor, only to be told the hand must be amputated. In this scenario, the victim did not exercise reasonable care and their hand injury grew progressively worse with time, i.e. they failed to mitigate damages. If this series of events occurred in a real life case, then the negligent party that caused the initial injury to the victim’s hand would not be held liable for the fact that the injury then resulted in amputation since the victim failed to seek proper medical attention within a reasonable time span after the accident.

A victim must do their best to mitigate damages or else they could stand to lose a sizable sum in compensation from a negligent party. Additionally, in Texas, if a defendant can prove that the plaintiff was indeed responsible for more than 50 percent of their own damages, the case could be dismissed entirely, resulting in no compensation at all for the injured victim. By taking proper care of your injury, or ensuring that a loved one is taking proper care of themselves, in the aftermath of a car accident, you will be serving your best interests towards getting your due compensation in a personal injury lawsuit.