When you’ve been injured at work, in an accident, or by negligence, pursuing a compensation claim often turns on evidence. One practical but under-utilised tool is the pain & recovery diary (sometimes called a symptom diary or daily journal).
Keeping a disciplined and contemporaneous record of your pain, symptoms, treatments and recovery helps in several key ways both for Workers’ Compensation claims and personal injury claims. Below, we explain how a diary can strengthen your case, what to record (and how), and why getting legal help is crucial.
Why a diary matters (legally and practically)
In New South Wales, workplace injuries are governed by the Workers Compensation Act 1987 (NSW) among other statutes. In that regime, insurers may challenge claims by pointing to lack of evidence of causation, severity or ongoing impairment. A detailed diary can help you meet the evidentiary burden and defend against challenges.
In general personal injury (e.g. motor vehicle accident or public liability claims), pain and suffering (non-economic loss) is assessed in part by examining how the injury disrupts daily life and well-being. A diary can help fill the gap between medical records and the experience of your injury.
A well-kept diary can help across the following dimensions:
- Chronology and sequence such as establishing when pain flared, how it progressed, and correlating it with the triggering incident or treatment changes
- Recording a daily pain score (e.g. on a 0–10 scale), noting fluctuations, aggravating or easing factors
- Functional impact by documenting specific limitations (walking, sleeping, lifting, concentrating) on each day
- Treatment, medications, side effects by recording what therapies or medicines you took, when, and how effective they were
- Mood, sleep, stress and capturing the psychological or secondary effects of pain
- Missed activities or workdays such as instances when pain prevented you from performing routine tasks or returning to work
Such diaries help tie together medical reports, witness evidence and your legal arguments into a more persuasive narrative.
What to include and how to do it well
To be credible, a diary must be detailed, consistent and contemporaneous, not retrospective generalisations. Some best practices:
Date and time: Begin each entry with the date and approximate time (morning, afternoon, evening)
Pain severity/scale: Use a consistent numeric or descriptive scale (e.g. “5/10 in morning, 7/10 after walking”)
Triggers or changes: Note what you were doing when pain worsened or eased (e.g. “stood up”, “rested 20 min”)
Functional limitations: Be specific (“couldn’t dress my left arm”, “walked only 200 m”)
Medication/treatment: Record dose, time, side effects, perceived relief
Mood, sleep, psychological effect: Note if pain caused anxiety, insomnia, mood swings
Missed tasks/work: List specific tasks you could not complete and why
Avoid vague general statements (e.g. “I felt terrible all day”) without context or detail. Diary entries are more persuasive when they are dated and tied to concrete events.
How a diary helps your compensation claim
- Corroborating your timeline
If there is dispute about when symptoms began, a diary offers a contemporaneous record to support your version of events. - Supporting causation arguments
You can show the link between the triggering incident and a worsening of symptoms, or link flare-ups to known aggravating factors. - Countering insurer skepticism or challenges
Insurers often attack claims on inconsistencies or gaps. A diary can reduce those vulnerabilities. - Enriching medical evidence
When your treating specialist or independent expert examines you, they can compare your diary with clinical snapshots to assess consistency and trajectory. - Quantifying non-economic loss
Evidence of daily suffering, sleep disturbance, loss of enjoyment of life can feed into general damages (in personal injury claims) or impairment assessments. - Creates the basis for a draft statement to be used in future proceedings.
Engage a specialist lawyer early to maximise claim success
While a diary is a powerful tool, it does not replace legal strategy. Engaging a lawyer specialising in workplace injury, compensation or personal injury law early helps ensure your diary and other evidence are used optimally.
If you’re preparing a compensation claim and haven’t been keeping a diary, it is not too late to start, but the sooner you do, the stronger your position becomes. For help structuring your evidence and optimising your claim, contact our expert compensation lawyers.