What Shapes the Value of a Child's Injury Claim

Attorney Answer

Do not name a number yet, and do not let the adjuster's request set the pace. An insurer asking an unrepresented parent to state a demand early, before anyone knows how the child healed, is asking the parent to do the insurer's work. What a child's claim is worth turns on facts that are usually not settled this soon, and this page cannot value your daughter's claim — no honest source can, from the outside.

What can be described is what goes into it. Past medical and hospital charges are the floor, not the claim. Beyond them: whether her doctors expect any further care, follow-up or imaging as she grows; whether the fracture is expected to leave any lasting limitation; the pain and the weeks of restriction themselves; and what she missed — school, sports, ordinary childhood things. Your own losses are a separate matter from hers: the expenses you paid and the work you lost are generally the parent's claim, not the child's, and the two are usually presented and documented separately.

The driver's leaving is relevant, not just upsetting. Tex. Transp. Code § 550.021(a) requires the operator of a vehicle involved in a collision that results, or is reasonably likely to result, in injury to a person to stop immediately at or near the scene, return if the vehicle was not stopped there, determine whether anyone needs aid, and remain until complying with § 550.023 — which requires giving name, address, vehicle registration number and liability insurer to the injured person, and providing reasonable assistance including arranging transport for treatment where it is apparently needed. Failing to stop and comply is a crime, graded by the seriousness of the injury, and the fact that a detective became involved reflects that. It does not by itself increase what an insurer must pay, but it explains why the liability side of this may not be seriously contested.

One more thing to know before you respond to that adjuster: a settlement of a minor's claim in Texas is not an ordinary agreement between a parent and an insurance company. There is a process for approving and safeguarding a child's settlement, and a release signed the wrong way can be both unenforceable and damaging. Ask a lawyer about that specifically before you sign anything or cash any check.

What you can do

1. Get her complete medical records and itemized bills from every provider, including the ambulance and the emergency room.

2. Ask the treating doctor, in writing, whether any follow-up, restriction or future care is expected as she grows, and keep the answer.

3. Keep your own records: what you paid out of pocket, and the dates and hours of work you missed, with pay stubs.

4. Ask the insurer in writing to confirm the policy limits and the named insured. Put the request in writing and keep the reply.

5. Do not give the insurer a settlement figure, and do not sign a release or deposit a settlement check, before a Texas attorney reviews it. Settling a child's claim is very hard to undo.

6. Ask a lawyer about court approval of a minor's settlement, how the money would be held for her, and whether your own expense and lost-wage claim is presented separately.

Most lawyers offer a brief initial call at no cost, and a few minutes on your specific facts is worth more than any general guidance, including this page.

⏱ Time limits apply. Tex. Civ. Prac. & Rem. Code § 16.003(a) requires a personal injury suit within two years after the day the cause of action accrues. A minor's deadline can work differently from an adult's, and the parent's own claim and the child's claim may not run together — that is exactly the kind of question to put to a Texas attorney now, with the records in hand. Do not calculate it from a calendar.