Mental Health Compensation Claims

Mental health compensation claims may be possible if a person or organisation failed to meet the standard expected of them and this caused a recognised psychiatric illness or significantly worsened an existing condition. A psychological injury claim can arise after an incident such as a road traffic accident or an accident at work. Conditions including post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD), clinical depression or an anxiety disorder may support a claim where medical evidence connects the mental health injury to what happened. If successful, compensation can reflect the psychiatric injury itself as well as financial losses caused by its effects, such as treatment costs or time away from work. Accident Claims can assess your circumstances, with eligible claims handled on a No Win No Fee basis.

A psychological injury can continue to affect your life long after the event that caused it. Intrusive memories may make travelling difficult after a collision, while anxiety or psychological trauma can interfere with your ability to work or manage everyday routines. For mental health compensation claims, the key issue is whether another person or organisation failed to meet the standard expected of them and this caused a recognised psychiatric injury, rather than emotional distress alone.

That distinction makes strong medical evidence especially important. Through Accident Claims, you can access experienced legal specialists with decades of combined expertise and a track record of securing more than £100 million in compensation. A solicitor can examine how the psychological harm developed and build a clear account of its connection to the event in question.

During a free consultation, we can discuss what happened, assess whether your circumstances justify further investigation and explain your legal options.

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Jump To A Section

1. Can I Claim Compensation For The Psychological Impact Of An Accident?
2. What Types Of Accidents Could Cause A Mental Illness?
3. How Could An Accident Change Your Mental Health And Daily Life?
4. Can I Claim If I Already Had A Mental Health Condition?
5. Can I Claim After Witnessing Someone Else Being Injured?
6. Which Psychological Conditions Could Form Part Of A Claim?
7. What Can Mental Health Compensation Account For?
8. How Our Solicitors Build Psychological Injury Claims
9. Can I Make A No Win No Fee Psychological Injury Claim?
10. Learn More

Can I Claim Compensation For The Psychological Impact Of An Accident?

Yes, you can claim compensation for the psychological impact of an accident if another person or organisation was responsible for your safety, failed to meet the standard expected of them and this caused you to develop a recognised psychiatric injury. Mental health compensation claims can also be considered where an accident materially worsened an existing psychological condition, provided there is sufficient evidence connecting that deterioration to what happened. Where these criteria are met, the psychiatric injury may form part of a claim for personal injury compensation.

When assessing whether you may be eligible to claim, the following factors can be considered:

• Whether someone was responsible for protecting you from the circumstances that caused the psychological harm. This will depend on how the incident arose and who had control over the risk. For example, an employer may have been responsible for addressing a known risk of violence at work, while a driver may be responsible where a serious collision exposed another road user to a traumatic event.
• Whether the expected standard of care was met before the traumatic event occurred. The issue is whether reasonable steps should have been taken to prevent the incident that later caused the mental health injury. This could include failing to act on repeated reports of a dangerous workplace situation or driving in a way that created an avoidable risk of a serious crash.
• Whether the incident caused a recognised psychiatric injury. Mental health compensation claims require evidence of a recognised condition rather than distress alone. Medical evidence can help establish whether post-traumatic stress disorder developed after the incident or whether an existing psychiatric condition became materially worse because of what happened.

Does A Mental Health Condition Need To Be Formally Diagnosed?

You do not need a formal diagnosis before speaking to a solicitor, but a successful psychological injury claim will usually require medical evidence confirming a recognised psychiatric condition. An independent medical assessment can help establish the diagnosis, whether the condition was caused or worsened by the incident and the likely course of your recovery.

Can I Claim For Distress, Upset Or Temporary Anxiety?

Distress, upset or temporary anxiety on their own will not usually be enough to support a psychological injury claim. Compensation generally requires evidence of a recognised psychiatric injury rather than a short-lived emotional reaction to the accident.

Can I Claim Without Suffering A Physical Injury?

Yes, you may still be able to claim for psychiatric harm even if you suffered no physical injury. The condition must amount to a recognised psychiatric illness and the medical evidence must support a connection between the negligent incident and the psychological harm.

Get in touch with our solicitors at Accident Claims today for a free consultation about your psychological injury. We can assess what happened, explain whether you may have grounds to claim and outline the medical evidence that could help support your case.

What Types Of Accidents Could Cause A Mental Illness?

Accidents that are sudden, frightening or seriously disruptive can cause a mental illness by exposing someone to trauma or leaving them struggling with the aftermath of what happened. This may include road traffic accidents, accidents at work or serious incidents in public places where the psychological effects continue after the physical danger has passed.

Contact Accident Claims if an accident has caused lasting psychological harm. We can review what happened, explain whether you have grounds to pursue compensation and, where appropriate, connect you with a specialist solicitor who can begin gathering the evidence needed to build your claim.

How Could An Accident Change Your Mental Health And Daily Life?

An accident could change your mental health and daily life by causing lasting psychological effects that make ordinary activities harder to manage. You may experience anxiety, intrusive memories or low mood after a frightening incident, particularly if it left you feeling unsafe in situations that previously felt routine.

These psychological effects can change how you manage everyday life. Travelling may become difficult after a road traffic accident, while returning to work after a workplace incident can feel overwhelming. Some people begin avoiding places or situations that remind them of what happened. Sleep problems or poor concentration can also make work and everyday responsibilities harder to manage, while heightened anxiety may affect relationships, independence and confidence.

For some people, the impact develops into a recognised psychiatric condition such as post traumatic stress disorder or clinical depression. Others may find that an existing mental health condition becomes significantly worse after the accident.

Mental health compensation claims should reflect the real effect the condition has had on your life, not just the diagnosis itself. Medical evidence can help establish the severity and likely course of the condition, while treatment records, employment evidence and details of how your routines have changed can show the wider impact on your work, independence and mental wellbeing.

Speak to Accident Claims for a free consultation about the psychological impact of your accident. We can assess how your mental health and daily life have changed and how this will affect a compensation claim.

Can I Claim If I Already Had A Mental Health Condition?

Yes. You may still be able to claim if an accident or negligent event materially worsened a pre-existing mental health condition. The key question is whether the incident caused additional psychological harm beyond the symptoms you were already experiencing.

Medical records can help show your mental health before and after the incident, while independent expert evidence can assess whether your condition became more severe, required additional treatment or affected your daily life in new ways.

Compensation would focus on the additional harm caused by the incident rather than the condition as it existed beforehand. Our solicitors can review your medical history, identify the changes that followed the accident and explain whether the evidence supports a claim for the worsening of your mental health.

Can I Claim After Witnessing Someone Else Being Injured?

You may be able to claim after witnessing someone else being injured if you meet the legal requirements for a secondary victim claim. This can apply where you directly witnessed a traumatic accident involving someone with whom you have a close tie of love and affection and later developed a recognised psychiatric illness as a result.

A secondary victim will generally need to show that they were sufficiently close to the accident in time and place, witnessed it through their own senses or encountered its immediate aftermath, and developed a recognised psychiatric illness as a result. Simply being told about the accident later will not normally satisfy these requirements.

This is different from a primary victim claim, where the claimant was personally exposed to danger or the risk of physical injury. Secondary victim claims are more restricted because the law limits recovery to people who have a sufficiently close relationship with the person involved and a direct connection to the accident.

Our solicitors can examine exactly what you witnessed, your relationship with the person involved and the psychiatric evidence to assess whether the requirements for a secondary victim claim may be met.

Which Psychological Conditions Could Form Part Of A Claim?

Psychological conditions such as post-traumatic stress disorder, clinical depression and recognised anxiety disorders could form part of a claim if they were caused by the accident or materially worsened because of it. The condition must amount to a recognised psychiatric illness rather than temporary shock, upset or short-lived anxiety.

The way psychological harm presents can vary considerably. Post traumatic stress disorder may leave you struggling with reminders of the incident or avoiding situations connected to it. Depression can affect motivation, sleep and your ability to manage everyday routines, while anxiety disorders may make work, travel or social situations feel difficult or unsafe. Some people may develop an adjustment disorder as they struggle to cope with the consequences of an accident or injury.

The diagnosis is only part of the picture. What also matters is whether the condition was caused or worsened by what happened, how severe the symptoms became and the effect they have had on your daily life.

Medical evidence can help establish the diagnosis, likely cause and prognosis. This allows the psychological injury to be assessed in the context of your recovery, independence and day-to-day functioning, so the claim reflects the real impact of the condition rather than the diagnostic label alone.

Speak to one of our friendly advisors about your mental health diagnosis and the accident that caused it.

What Can Mental Health Compensation Account For?

The amount of compensation awarded for a psychological injury depends on the condition you developed and the extent to which it has affected your life. Mental health compensation claims are valued individually because someone who makes a strong recovery from short-term symptoms will usually be affected very differently from someone living with severe and persistent psychiatric harm.

When valuing the psychological injury itself, relevant factors can include:

• The severity of the condition: The diagnosis, intensity of the symptoms and how much they restrict your everyday functioning can all influence the value of the psychiatric injury.
• Your prognosis and recovery: Medical evidence can help establish whether you are expected to make a substantial recovery or whether the condition is likely to have a longer-term effect on your mental wellbeing.
• The impact on everyday life: The effect on your ability to work, maintain relationships, sleep and manage normal activities can all be relevant when the psychological injury is valued.
• Treatment and future vulnerability: The treatment you have required, whether further therapy is likely to be needed and whether you remain vulnerable to future psychological difficulties may all affect the valuation.

Compensation Guidelines

Compensation for the pain, suffering and loss of amenity caused by a psychiatric injury is assessed as general damages. Our solicitors can compare the independent medical evidence with the Judicial College Guidelines (JCG) to identify the bracket that most closely reflects the severity and likely course of the psychiatric injury.

The JCG is a document that provides guideline compensation brackets for different levels of psychiatric damage and post traumatic stress disorder. We’ve used it to put together the table below. It should be noted that these figures do not guarantee how much compensation you will receive because the final value of a claim depends on your individual evidence and circumstances. Also, the first row is not from the JCG.

Harm	Notes	Compensation
More than one very severe psychological injury and special damages	Various severe psychological injuries and special damages such as counselling costs, medical expenses or lost income	Up to £500,000+
General psychiatric harm	Severe (a) - when this bracket is being valued, the injured person's ability to cope with life, work and education will be taken into consideration	£72,440 - £152,900
	Moderately Severe (b) - there will be significant problems but a much more optimistic prognosis	£25,190 - £72,440
	Moderate (c) - marked improvement by trial and a good prognosis	£7,740 - £25,190
	Less Severe (d) - the amount awarded will consider the duration of disability and how much sleep and daily activities were impacted	£2,040 - £7,740
PTSD	Severe (a) - permanent impacts which prevent the person from functioning near a pre-trauma level, with all aspects of life being impacted	£79,080 - £133,000
	Moderately Severe (b) - better prognosis than above but the impacts are still likely to cause significant disability for the foreseeable future. Professional help has led to some recovery	£30,580 - £79,080
	Moderate (c) - the injured person will have largely recovered and any continuing impacts will not be grossly disabling	£10,810 - £30,580
	Less Severe (d) - a virtual full recovery will have been made and only minor symptoms will persist	£5,220 - £10,810

What Financial Losses Could Be Recovered After A Psychological Injury?

Financial losses that could be recovered after a psychological injury include income you have lost because the condition affected your ability to work and reasonable costs created by the need for treatment. The claim may also reflect ongoing financial consequences where the psychiatric injury continues to limit your working capacity or independence. In a successful claim, these losses may be recovered alongside compensation for the psychiatric injury itself. They are known as special damages.

Mental health compensation claims can recover:

• Lost earnings: A psychiatric injury may make it difficult to return to work, particularly where symptoms such as panic attacks or trauma-related distress are triggered by the working environment. Compensation can reflect income lost during periods of absence, with future losses considered where the condition continues to restrict the work you can do.
• Psychological treatment costs: If your recovery requires private psychological therapy, the reasonable cost of that treatment may be included in the claim. This can be particularly relevant where specialist support is recommended to address the effects of the accident.
• Prescription costs: Charges for medication prescribed to manage symptoms caused by the psychiatric injury may also be recoverable. This could apply where treatment for anxiety, depression or trauma-related symptoms continues over an extended period.
• Future support costs: Severe or long-lasting psychiatric injuries can create an ongoing need for professional psychological support. Where that need is expected to continue, future treatment costs may be reflected in the compensation awarded.

Every financial loss must be evidenced and linked to the injury. Our solicitors can help identify the records needed, calculate both current and future losses and make sure the financial effects of your mental health condition are properly reflected in the claim.

How Our Solicitors Build Psychological Injury Claims

Psychological injury compensation claims often depend on bringing together evidence about how the accident happened, how your mental health changed afterwards and the financial effect of the condition. Our solicitors can investigate each of these areas and build a clear picture of the harm caused.

Can I Make A No Win No Fee Psychological Injury Claim?

Yes, if your psychiatric injury claim is accepted by one of our solicitors, it may be handled on a No Win No Fee basis under a Conditional Fee Agreement (CFA). This means you do not pay your solicitor’s service fees upfront or while the claim is ongoing.

If the claim is unsuccessful, you will not pay those service fees. If it succeeds, a success fee is deducted as a percentage from your compensation and is subject to a legal cap.

We will explain how the CFA works before you decide whether to proceed, including the success fee and any other terms that apply.

Contact Our Team About A Psychological Injury

Contact Accident Claims for a free consultation if an accident has caused lasting psychological harm. We can explain whether your circumstances may support mental health compensation claims and, where appropriate, connect you with a specialist solicitor who can guide you through the next steps.

• Call us on 0800 073 8801
• Contact us online
• Speak to an advisor using our live chat

Learn More

Read some of our other guides about:

• Find out how long you have to claim for your mental health injury with our guide on the limitation period.
• An interim payment can be made when it looks like your case will settle but the final settlement hasn’t been reached.
• If you’ve suffered an accident due to a roll cage, you can find out how to claim and how our solicitors can help.

Helpful External Resources

• NHS guidance on mental health conditions.
• The government provides eligibility information on claiming Statutory Sick Pay.
• Managing sick leave and a return to work, from the Health and Safety Executive.

Thank you for reading our mental health compensation claims guide.