
Subrogation in Personal Injury Claims
In the past, I’ve had many clients startled by the fact that their health insurance company is seeking reimbursement for the care that they received after an accident. There seems to be a lot of confusion surrounding subrogation in personal injury claims. That is why I decided to create a blog post to inform clients about their rights when it comes to subrogation in personal injury claims. If you suffered a serious injury, there is a good chance that you have started to rack up a lot of medical bills. Hopefully, you have good health insurance that will cover you on those bills and you won’t have to pay a lot of money out of pocket. If your health insurance company or Medicaid/Medicare provider paid for your medical bills arising from a personal injury, they will likely want to be reimbursed if you decide to file a personal injury lawsuit. This is done through a process called subrogation. Instead of filing a lawsuit against the defendant, Medicare/Medicaid or your health insurance provider will place a lien on your personal injury case and request that you reimburse them once your case is settled.
What is Subrogation?
If you’ve sustained a personal injury in the state of Florida and a third party such as a health insurer paid for your medical treatment because of the injuries from that accident, you may have to deal with the subrogation process. When you get a settlement from the at fault party, your health insurance company will want you to reimburse them for what they paid. Unfortunately, subrogation essentially means that your health insurance company can make a claim to get repaid for medical bills that they paid on your behalf. If the claim is valid, it can dramatically eat into your portion of settlement dollars. Subrogation rights come up in personal injury cases involving an automobile accident, medical malpractice, slip and fall, dog bite, etc. In all personal injury cases, the injured person is entitled to recover money damages from another person or company or insurance company due to the negligence of the other person causing the injury. In many cases, before that recovery becomes due, the injured party may collect compensation from a health insurance provider, Medicare, Medicaid, or the like. These sources of funds are commonly referred to as collateral sources under Florida personal injury law. The question that I often get from clients is whether they need to reimburse Medicaid, Medicare, and health insurance providers for funds received for their injury. The answer is almost always yes. Subrogation is designed, in theory, to prevent a plaintiff from collecting more than once for the same element of damages. In this blog post, we will discuss subrogation in personal injury claims.
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