Anyone who quotes you a number for a catastrophic injury before reviewing the records is guessing. What decides the value is a short list of factors, and the biggest one is usually the one that is hardest to see: the cost of the future.
Updated October 2026
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Catastrophic injuries include severe brain injuries, spinal cord injuries, amputations, and other injuries that permanently change how a person lives. Cases like these range so widely that an average describes nothing.
What can be said is how the value of one is built, and what separates a carefully developed case from an opening offer.
Whether the injury will heal, improve, or last for life is the largest driver. A permanent injury, properly documented by treating doctors and specialists, is worth categorically more than the same injury described only by the bills to date.
Future medical care, therapy, equipment, home modifications, and attendant care are often the largest part of a catastrophic claim. A life care plan is what turns those future needs into numbers an insurer or jury can consider.
What the person could have earned over a working life, compared with what they can earn now, can be a very large part of the claim, especially for a younger person. It is usually proved with vocational and economic experts.
A catastrophic injury can exceed the at-fault driver's policy. Your own underinsured motorist coverage, other policies, and additional responsible parties, such as an employer or a company that owned a vehicle, can change what is available. Missouri generally does not cap compensatory damages in car accident cases, but what can actually be collected depends on the coverage and assets.
Clear fault raises value, and Missouri's pure comparative fault rule means any share of fault assigned to the injured person reduces the recovery. Insurers also price a claim by whether the firm on the other side is prepared to try the case.
A professional musician suffered a traumatic brain injury after being struck while crossing the street. The insurer opened low and the case settled for $3.5 million.
In another case, a red-light runner caused multiple disc replacements, a lower back fusion, and blood clots, and a St. Louis County jury returned $10,000,000.
Past results do not guarantee a future outcome, and every case depends on its own facts, including the injury, the insurance available, and the evidence developed.
A professional musician suffered a traumatic brain injury after being struck while crossing the street. The insurer opened at $350,000. Read full story →
A red light runner. Multiple disc replacements, a lower back fusion, and blood clots. A St. Louis County jury returned $10,000,000. Read full story →
A commercial truck driver crossed the centerline and struck our client head-on, causing catastrophic injuries. The trucking company's dash cam footage was never located. We secured a $19 million settlement. Read full story →
Ask your treating doctors for their opinion on permanence and future care, and make sure it is written down.
It has to be built, not assumed, and it is often the single largest driver of value.
The at-fault driver's policy may not be the only one. Your own coverage and other parties can matter a great deal.
Early offers come before the cost of the future is known.
There is no set number. Value depends on permanence, future care costs, lost earning capacity, available insurance, and liability. Cases vary enormously, and an average across them tells you nothing about any one case.
A life care plan is a document prepared by a qualified professional that itemizes a seriously injured person's future medical and care needs and their cost. It matters because a future need that has not been documented is hard to get an insurer or jury to value.
Missouri generally does not cap compensatory damages in car accident cases, although caps exist in some other areas, such as medical malpractice. What can be collected still depends on available insurance and assets, so an attorney should review the specifics.
Your own underinsured motorist coverage may apply, and there may be other responsible parties or policies, such as an employer, a vehicle owner, or a company. Identifying all of it early is part of the work.
An opening offer is made before the injury is fully documented and often before anyone knows whether the other side will try the case. In one of our cases, a $125,000 opening offer on a femur fracture became a $2.5 million settlement once the case was developed.
Longer than an ordinary claim, because the full extent of the injury has to be understood before the case can be valued. Settling early, before that is known, is one of the most common and costly mistakes.
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