Fact-Checked: Why Trust Rittgers Rittgers & Nakajima After a crash, most people think of “damages” as one number. Ohio law splits your losses into two categories, economic and noneconomic, and treats them very differently. Knowing the difference is often the difference between a fair settlement and a low one.
Economic Damages: The Losses with a Paper Trail
Under R.C. 2315.18(A)(2), economic loss covers lost wages and lost earning capacity, medical care and rehabilitation, vehicle damage, and any other expense the crash caused — home modifications, in-home help, paying someone to do the work you can no longer do.
There is no cap on economic damages. R.C. 2315.18(B)(1). If your bills and lost income total $400,000, you can pursue all of it.
Noneconomic Damages: Everything the Receipts Don’t Show
R.C. 2315.18(A)(4) defines noneconomic loss broadly — pain and suffering, mental anguish, disfigurement, loss of consortium and companionship, loss of care and guidance, and, in the statute’s own words, “any other intangible loss.” Loss of enjoyment of life falls squarely within that language.
In a serious case, this is usually the larger and more valuable part of the claim. It is also the part the insurance company fights hardest, because there is no invoice to point to. What it actually means is concrete:
- Sleeping in a recliner for eight months because you cannot lie flat
- Being unable to lift your grandchild
- Giving up the softball league, the garden, the motorcycle
- The scar you see every morning
- Needing your spouse to help you shower, and what that has done to your marriage
Consistent treatment, records that describe your limitations and not just your pain level, and witnesses who can say specifically what you used to do and no longer do are what turn that into a number a jury can award.
Ohio’s Cap on Noneconomic Damages
R.C. 2315.18(B)(2) limits noneconomic damages in an ordinary injury case to the greater of $250,000 or three times your economic loss, up to $350,000 per plaintiff or $500,000 per occurrence.
The Cap Often Does Not Apply — But That Is Where the Real Fight Is
Under R.C. 2315.18(B)(3), there is no limit at all on noneconomic damages if the injury involves permanent and substantial physical deformity, loss of use of a limb, loss of a bodily organ system, or a permanent functional injury that prevents you from independently caring for yourself. The cap is removed, not raised. The jury’s number stands.
However, the statute does not define any of those phrases. Is a scar a “permanent and substantial physical deformity”? Is nerve damage a “loss of use of a limb”? Is a bowel or bladder injury the loss of a “bodily organ system”? Those questions get argued case by case. Judges answer them differently. Counties answer them differently. And the medical proof it takes to win the argument has to be built into your case from the start, not raised at the end.
Insurance companies price cases assuming the cap applies. When it does not, the value changes completely. Whether you get there depends on your facts, your venue, your experts, and how the record was developed long before anyone sees a courtroom.
The type of case matters too. There is no cap at all in wrongful death claims — R.C. 2315.18(H)(3) exempts them, and the Ohio Constitution provides that damages for death caused by another’s wrongful act shall not be limited by law. Medical negligence claims run under a separate statute, R.C. 2323.43, with a different structure. The rules are not interchangeable.
This is work that requires lawyers who try these cases and know how these arguments land. We do it. It is not something an adjuster is going to sort out for you in the first thirty days.
Why It Matters
A crash with modest bills but a permanent injury may be worth far more than the medical specials suggest. The mistake is accepting a number before anyone has determined which set of rules applies to you.
Talk to a Lawyer Before You Accept a Number
If you or a loved one has been injured or killed in an Ohio car accident, call Rittgers Rittgers & Nakajima today for a case evaluation and make sure you pursue the full compensation you are owed.