Can (and Should) You Bring a Loss of Consortium Claim?

If you are in an accident, is it possible for someone who was not directly injured in the accident to sue for damages? It may seem like the answer is no — but because of what is known as a loss of consortium, the answer to that question is actually yes.

The law recognizes that when a spouse is injured in an accident, and their ability to carry on their daily lives, or do the things that they once did are altered, affected or impaired, that it isn’t just the person directly injured or impaired that’s suffered a loss — it’s that person’s spouse as well.

How Marriages Can be Affected

As the spouse of someone seriously injured, you can be affected in a number of ways.

One way is just the loss of the personality of the now injured person that you love. They may no longer be the happy, jovial, funny or easygoing person you once knew. They may (understandably) be dour, unhappy or depressed. These kinds of personality changes can seriously affect a relationship and a marriage.

Another type of loss, is the loss of services — those things that one spouse does for another in a marriage. Working on the house, taking care of the kids, or other tasks or chores that an injured spouse can now no longer do, or do as well or as often.

There is also the loss of activities or quality of life — those things that a couple does as leisure activities. Couples who would walk, play a sport, go to the library, watch TV, travel or do whatever else the couple once enjoyed to do together, now cannot be done, or can’t be done as well or as often, because of the injury.

Overall, you are telling the jury that the fundamental nature of your marital relationship has been damaged by the accident.

Should You Bring a Consortium Claim?

Loss of consortium claims brought by spouses, have pros and cons. The pro is, as we have explained, a spouse not directly injured in an accident can get compensation for the losses suffered because of the injured spouse’s disabilities or changes.

But in any loss of consortium claim, a spouse must be very open about their marriage, before and after the accident. This can entail having to tell the other side or the jury, what would otherwise be considered private information about the relationship.

You don’t need to have medical records or even therapy records to document the changes in your relationship, but they do have to be told to the jury in some way, and that normally is through the testimony of both spouses.

Defendants will often ask whether the couple had marriage counseling, how often they were intimate or how often they fought, before and after the accident.

Whether the benefit of compensation outweighs the intrusion of your marital privacy, is largely an individual decision, and one that you can discuss with your attorney.

Do you have a loss of consortium claim after your accident?  Call our Boston personal injury lawyers at The Law Office of Joseph Linnehan, Jr. today at 617-275-4200 for help.

Source:

plaintiffmagazine.com/recent-issues/item/loss-of-consortium