Pain and Suffering in Georgia Car Accident Cases

Georgia has no formula and no general cap for pain and suffering in a car accident case. The jury sets the amount; O.C.G.A. § 9-10-184(b), as rewritten by Senate Bill 68, describes the measure of noneconomic damages as “the enlightened conscience of an impartial jury.” What Senate Bill 68 changed in 2025 is when and how a lawyer may suggest a number: only after the evidence closes, only in the first argument on damages, and only if it is rationally related to the evidence.

What counts as pain and suffering

Senate Bill 68 rewrote O.C.G.A. § 9-10-184 and defined “noneconomic damages” to include “physical or emotional pain, discomfort, anxiety, hardship, distress, suffering, inconvenience, physical impairment, mental anguish, disfigurement, loss of enjoyment of life, loss of society and companionship, loss of consortium, injury to reputation,” and, in wrongful death cases, the noneconomic parts of the full value of life. Economic damages, by contrast, are the measurable losses: medical expenses, rehabilitation, lost wages and earning capacity, lost household services, and funeral costs.

Anxiety, fear of driving, and similar effects that follow a physical injury fall within those categories. When there was no physical injury, Georgia applies narrower rules, covered in emotional distress claims in Georgia car accident cases.

No cap in an ordinary car accident case

The cap on noneconomic damages that Georgia enacted for medical malpractice cases was held unconstitutional in Atlanta Oculoplastic Surgery, P.C. v. Nestlehutt (2010), and Senate Bill 68 regulates how noneconomic damages are argued, not how much a jury may award. Punitive damages are a separate category with their own limit, explained in punitive damages caps in Georgia.

When a lawyer may mention a number

Section 9-10-184 now sets three rules for trials of bodily injury and wrongful death claims:

Nothing before the evidence closes. Except as subsection (c) allows, counsel “shall not argue the worth or monetary value of noneconomic damages” and shall not, in the hearing of the jury or any prospective juror, “make any reference to, any specific amount or range of amounts of noneconomic damages”.
Only at the first damages argument. Counsel may argue a dollar value “only after the close of evidence and at the time of such party’s first opportunity to argue the issue of damages,” and the argument must be “rationally related to the evidence of noneconomic damages” without reference to “objects or values having no rational connection to the facts proved by the evidence.”
No new number in rebuttal. When one side has both the opening and the concluding argument after the evidence closes, subsection (c)(2) provides that its lawyer may not argue a value in the concluding argument unless one was argued in the opening argument, and may not argue “a different worth or monetary value” in the concluding argument than in the opening one.

The “opening argument” in that subsection is the first of the closing arguments, made after the evidence. It is not the opening statement at the start of trial. The statute does allow one question in jury selection: counsel may ask prospective jurors whether they could return a verdict with no damages or a verdict above “some unspecified amount,” if the evidence supports it.

Section 9 of Senate Bill 68 states the legislature’s intent that this section apply to causes of action pending when the act took effect on April 21, 2025, “unless such application would be unconstitutional.”

What the jury looks at

Because the measure is the jury’s judgment, the evidence that matters is evidence of how the injury changed the person’s days:

Treatment records showing the complaints reported at each visit, the diagnoses, and the course of recovery.
The person’s own testimony and that of family, coworkers, or friends about what changed.
Mental health records where anxiety, sleep problems, or post-traumatic stress were treated.
Permanence, shown by a physician’s opinion about lasting impairment or future pain.
Consistency. Gaps in treatment, surveillance, and social media posts can be used by the defense to argue the effects were smaller; how posts are used is covered in social media and Georgia car accident claims.

Multipliers and per diem figures

Settlement discussions sometimes frame pain and suffering as a multiple of medical expenses or as a daily rate. No Georgia statute or rule adopts either method, and § 9-10-184 governs what can be argued at trial. For example, imagine a negotiation in which one side proposes three times $20,000 in medical bills, or $60,000. That number has no legal status; what a jury could be asked for is limited to a figure rationally related to the evidence of the person’s noneconomic loss, argued at the time the statute allows. The figures are illustrative only.

How the pieces fit with other damages

Pain and suffering sits beside economic damages and, in some cases, punitive damages; the categories are mapped in types of damages in Georgia car accident claims. Medical expenses follow a different Senate Bill 68 rule, which applies to causes of action arising on or after April 21, 2025, explained in how SB 68 changed medical damage calculations in Georgia.

Sources

O.C.G.A. § 9-10-184 as revised by Senate Bill 68 (2025), as passed, § 1; applicability in § 9; Office of Legislative Counsel, 2025 Summary of General Statutes Enacted (effective April 21, 2025).
Atlanta Oculoplastic Surgery, P.C. v. Nestlehutt, 286 Ga. 731 (2010)

This page describes Georgia law as of October 2026 for general information. It is not legal advice and does not create an attorney-client relationship.