Common Causes of Burn Injuries in Ohio
Burns can happen anywhere heat, flame, electricity, or chemicals are present. The causes we see most often include:
House and Apartment Fires
Faulty wiring, broken furnaces, space heaters, missing or dead smoke detectors, and blocked exits turn small fires into deadly ones. In rental housing and hotels, the owner’s maintenance, or lack of it, is often at the center of the case.
Vehicle Fires
Car, truck, and motorcycle crashes can rupture fuel lines and batteries and start fires, and tanker crashes can cause explosions. Riders thrown onto hot pavement or pinned against a hot engine also suffer serious road rash and burn injuries.
Workplace Burns
Workers in factories, restaurants, refineries, and construction face burns from hot equipment, molten metal, steam, and fires. Missing guards, poor training, and broken safety equipment are common factors.
Electrical and Chemical Burns
Contact with power lines, exposed wiring, or faulty equipment can cause electrical burns that damage tissue deep below a small skin wound. Chemical burns from acids, cleaners, and industrial products can eat through skin and damage the eyes and lungs.
Scalding
Scalding water and steam cause many burns, especially to young children and older adults. Water heaters set too high, broken mixing valves, and hot liquids served carelessly at restaurants are frequent causes.
Gas Leaks and Explosions
Natural gas and propane leaks can cause explosions that destroy homes and businesses and burn everyone nearby. These cases often involve a gas utility, a contractor who worked on the lines, or a faulty appliance or connector.
Defective Products
Exploding batteries, phones, e-cigarettes, and e-bikes, along with faulty heaters, appliances, and gas cans, can burn people who use them exactly as intended.
Who Is Liable for a Burn Injury
Finding everyone who shares responsibility is often the key to a full recovery in a burn case. Depending on how the burn happened, liable parties may include:
- Property owners and landlords who ignore fire hazards, code violations, or broken equipment. These cases fall under premises liability law.
- Manufacturers and sellers of defective products, which our Ohio product liability lawyers pursue.
- Negligent drivers and trucking companies whose crashes cause vehicle fires.
- Contractors and maintenance companies that install or repair gas lines, wiring, or equipment carelessly.
- Utility companies that fail to maintain power lines or gas service safely.
- Businesses that serve dangerously hot food or drink or fail to keep their premises safe.
When More Than One Party Is to Blame
Fires and explosions rarely have a single cause. An apartment fire might involve a landlord who ignored a wiring problem, an electrician who did shoddy work, and a manufacturer whose smoke detector failed. Ohio law divides fault among everyone responsible, and how much each party pays can depend on its share of the blame. Insurers for each party will often point at the others, so identifying every responsible party early, and preserving the evidence against each one, can make a large difference in the final recovery. Even if you made a mistake yourself, you can still recover as long as you were not more than 50 percent at fault, though your award is reduced by your share.
Workplace Burns and Workers’ Compensation
Most workers burned on the job are covered by Ohio workers’ compensation, which pays medical bills and part of lost wages without proof of fault. Our workers’ compensation lawyers can help with that claim. In most cases you cannot sue your employer, and Ohio allows employer intentional tort claims only in narrow circumstances. But a separate injury claim is often possible against someone else, such as the maker of a defective machine, a contractor on the site, or the owner of the property where you were working, and that claim can recover pain and suffering that workers’ compensation does not pay.
The Cost of Treating a Severe Burn
The costs of a serious burn add up quickly and keep growing long after the first hospital stay.
Burn Unit Care
Severe burns are often treated in specialized burn centers. Patients receive fluids to fight shock and dehydration, antibiotics to prevent infection, and strong pain medication. Doctors must remove dead tissue, sometimes many times, because it raises the risk of infection and stops healing. Stays can last weeks.
Skin Grafts and Scar Revision
Deep burns are closed with skin grafts, which take healthy skin from another part of the body. Many patients need several grafting surgeries, followed by years of scar revision and reconstructive surgery as scars tighten and limit movement. Pressure garments, physical therapy, and occupational therapy are often needed to keep joints moving. When damage is too severe to repair, doctors may have to amputate fingers, hands, or limbs, which our amputation lawyers also handle.
Rehabilitation and Therapy
Healing skin pulls tight as it scars, which can lock fingers, elbows, shoulders, and necks in place. Burn survivors often spend months in physical and occupational therapy stretching scar tissue, rebuilding strength, and relearning everyday tasks like dressing, writing, and cooking. Custom pressure garments and splints are worn for a year or more to flatten scars and keep joints moving, and they must be replaced as they wear out. These costs continue long after the burn itself has closed, and they belong in any settlement.
Scarring, Disability, and PTSD
Burns can permanently change how a person looks, especially on the face, neck, and hands, and the reactions of others can lead to isolation, depression, and anxiety. Many burn survivors also live with post-traumatic stress disorder, nightmares, and fear of fire or heat. Lost mobility and strength can make it hard to return to work or care for yourself. A fair recovery has to account for all of it, not just the hospital bills.
Lost Income and Future Care
Many burn survivors miss months of work, and some can never return to the job they had. Hands and joints damaged by burns may not regain the strength or flexibility a job demands, and sensitivity to heat and sunlight can rule out outdoor or industrial work. A full claim looks ahead: future surgeries, years of scar treatment, therapy, counseling, and the income you will lose over your career. We work with doctors, vocational experts, and economists to put a number on those future losses before any settlement is signed.
Burn Injuries to Children
Children suffer burns from scalding bath water, hot drinks, space heaters, house fires, and defective products, and their thin skin burns faster and deeper than an adult’s. A child’s burns may need treatment and reconstructive surgery as they grow, because scars do not stretch the way healthy skin does. Ohio generally gives injured children until they turn 18 before the usual two-year deadline starts, but parents’ own claims for medical bills follow their own deadlines, so it is best to act early.
What to Do After a Burn Injury
The first priority is medical care. After that, a few steps protect your claim:
- Get emergency treatment: call 911 for any serious burn, electrical injury, or smoke exposure, and follow the advice of medical professionals.
- Report the incident: make sure the fire department, police, property owner, or employer knows what happened and creates a report.
- Preserve the evidence: keep the product, device, or clothing involved, and do not let anyone repair or throw away what caused the burn.
- Take photos: photograph the scene and your injuries, and keep photographing them as they heal.
- Keep records: save medical bills, receipts, and notes about your pain, treatment, and missed work.
- Talk to a lawyer before speaking with insurers: adjusters may contact you quickly and ask for statements that limit your claim.
How We Prove a Burn Injury Claim
Burn cases often turn on technical evidence about how a fire started or why a product failed. To build your claim, we gather:
- Fire and incident reports from the fire department, the state fire marshal, or the police.
- Expert analysis from fire investigators, electrical engineers, and product experts who can pinpoint the cause.
- The product or equipment itself, preserved before it can be repaired or thrown away.
- Maintenance and inspection records for the building, vehicle, or machine involved.
- Medical records and photographs that document your burns and how they have healed.
- Testimony from your doctors and a life care planner about future surgeries, therapy, and costs.
To succeed, a burn injury claim must show that:
- The other party had a duty of care toward you
- This duty was breached by a failure to act reasonably
- The breach of this duty caused your burns
- You suffered harm that you can be compensated for
For instance, if you were burned by scalding water in a rented apartment, you and your lawyer would need to show that the landlord had a duty to keep the water heater in safe working order, failed to fix a known problem, and that the failure caused your burns. Then you would show the harm: your medical bills, time off work, and pain and suffering.
Compensation for Burn Injuries
Depending on the severity of your burns and how they happened, you may be able to recover:
- Medical expenses, including future surgeries and therapy
- Lost income and reduced earning capacity
- Disability and loss of function
- Scarring and disfigurement
- Pain and suffering
- Mental anguish: Anxiety, depression, nightmares, and fear of fire or heat that often follow a serious burn.
Severe burns often leave permanent scarring or deformity, and when they do, Ohio’s limit on some non-economic damages does not apply. A spouse may also have a separate claim for loss of consortium.
Ohio Burn Injury FAQs
Can I sue my landlord for a house fire?
Sometimes. Ohio law requires landlords to keep electrical, heating, and other systems in good and safe working order and to follow building and safety codes. If a fire started because a landlord ignored faulty wiring, a broken furnace, missing smoke detectors, or blocked exits, the landlord may be responsible for the injuries. A lawyer can review the fire investigation and the landlord’s repair records to find out.
How much is a burn injury case worth?
It depends on how deep and widespread the burns are, the treatment needed, scarring, lost income, and the insurance available. Severe burns often involve months of treatment and future surgeries, which drives the value up. Ohio caps some non-economic damages in injury cases, but the cap does not apply when an injury causes permanent and substantial physical deformity, which a severe burn can.
Can I file a claim for a burn at work?
Yes. Workers’ compensation covers most on-the-job burns regardless of fault, paying medical bills and part of lost wages. You generally cannot sue your employer, but if a defective machine, a contractor, or another outside party caused the burn, you may also have a separate injury claim against that party.
Who pays for skin grafts?
At first, your health insurance, workers’ compensation if you were hurt at work, or medical payments coverage on an auto policy usually pays for treatment, including skin grafts. When another party caused the burn, their insurance should ultimately cover these costs, along with future surgeries, through a settlement or verdict. Insurers that paid your bills may be repaid from the recovery, which a lawyer can help negotiate.
How long do I have to file?
Most burn injury lawsuits in Ohio must be filed within two years of the injury, and wrongful death claims generally within two years of the death. Some claims, such as those involving medical care or a government agency, follow different rules, so it is best to talk with a lawyer soon.
Burn Injury Lawyers Near You
KNR has 12 offices throughout Ohio, and we represent burn victims statewide. For burns in Northeast Ohio, our Cleveland burn injury lawyers can help, and in central Ohio, you can reach a Columbus burn injury lawyer. You can also contact an attorney at one of our other offices:
Contact Our Ohio Burn Injury Lawyers for Help
If you suffered a serious burn because of someone else’s negligence, call Kisling, Nestico & Redick right away. Our legal team has extensive experience helping burn victims recover compensation through insurance claims and lawsuits, and there is no fee unless we recover money for you.
Call us today at 1-800-HURT-NOW to schedule a free, no-risk consultation.
