Capacity In Personal Injury Claims: What You Need To Know

A serious injury can affect more than a person’s physical health. It can also affect a person’s ability to make decisions. If this affects their legal claim, questions of capacity may arise.

What is capacity?

Capacity is a person’s ability to make a specific decision for themselves. In a personal injury claim, this may include understanding the case, considering legal advice and making informed decisions about how the case should progress.

Capacity issues often arise in cases involving brain injuries, neurological conditions or psychiatric illness, or where the claimant has dementia or learning disabilities.

Having one of these conditions does not mean a person lacks capacity. Equally, someone may cope well day to day but still struggle to make decisions about a legal claim.