Understanding Spinal Cord Injury Damages in New Mexico

Short Answer: Can You Recover Damages After a Spinal Cord Injury in New Mexico?

Economic losses include medical bills and lost income. Non-economic losses include pain, emotional distress, and loss of the activities that made life enjoyable. Spinal cord injuries are among the most serious injuries these claims involve, so the losses can be large and long lasting.

Two facts shape which losses show up and how big they become. The first is the injury level: cervical (neck), thoracic (upper back), lumbar (lower back), or sacral (pelvis). The second is whether the injury is complete or incomplete, meaning how much feeling and movement remains below the injury. The categories below are a framework. The value of any claim turns on the facts of that case.

Economic Damages: Past and Future Medical Expenses

Medical costs are economic damages, and they often make up a large share of a spinal cord injury claim. Past medical expenses cover what has already been billed or paid. That includes emergency transport, hospital stays, surgery, imaging, medications, and rehabilitation.

Future medical expenses cover care the injured person will likely need later. These costs can include follow-up visits with treating doctors, ongoing therapy, replacement equipment, and treatment for complications that appear over time. Researchers who study traumatic spinal cord injury look at how neurological recovery unfolds over time. That is why long-term needs are usually assessed over months and years, not all at once.

Documentation matters. Keep every bill, statement, and discharge summary. Ask treating providers to record expected future care in their written notes. A common mistake is to assume the first hospital bill tells the whole story. Future costs are often the part people miss when they ask what damages can I recover after a spinal cord injury in New Mexico.

Lost Income and Loss of Earning Capacity

Lost income covers wages already missed. Loss of earning capacity covers a reduced ability to earn in the future. The two are different. A person may go back to work and still earn less for life if the injury limits the physical demands they can meet.

When future earnings are weighed, people often look at age, education, work history, and the physical demands of the job. Skills that carry over to other work matter too. Lost benefits, such as employer retirement contributions, can also be part of the economic loss.

A common mistake is to count only the paychecks missed in the first few months. Keep pay stubs, tax forms, and a letter from the employer about time off and job duties. Also keep records of shifts you could no longer work and any changes to your schedule or role.

Future Care Needs: Life Care Plans, Attendant Care, Home Modifications, and Equipment

A life care plan is a written projection of the medical, therapy, equipment, and support needs an injured person may have in the future. It is often prepared with input from medical and vocational professionals, such as doctors and work-capacity experts. Its purpose is to put future needs into one organized document.

Common needs include attendant care. This is help with bathing, dressing, transfers, meals, and other daily tasks, often at home. Mobility equipment, such as wheelchairs, is another category. Home modifications can include ramps, widened doorways, roll-in showers, and lower counters. Vehicle adaptations, such as hand controls or a lift, matter for a person who still drives or rides.

These needs can be underestimated early on, when the focus is on stabilizing the injury. They can change as the person’s condition or living situation changes. Writing them down early, with the treating team’s input, gives a clearer picture of what the person will need.

Non-Economic Damages: Pain, Suffering, and Loss of Enjoyment

Non-economic damages pay for harm that doesn’t come with a receipt. That includes physical pain, emotional distress, and loss of enjoyment of life. They also cover loss of independence and the inability to take part in hobbies, sports, or family activities.

Mental and emotional effects often come with a spinal cord injury. Depression, anxiety, and the hard work of adjusting to a new way of living show up in medical and counseling records. Ask the treating team to document these concerns. They become part of the medical story.

Because pain has no invoice, the details matter. A simple daily journal can record what you can no longer do, such as cooking a meal, driving a child to school, or sleeping through the night. The injured person’s own account, told in their own words, also carries weight.

Loss of Consortium and Impact on Family

A spouse or partner may have a separate claim for loss of consortium. This claim covers the loss of companionship and the close bond the two shared. Under Thompson v. City of Albuquerque, these damages belong to the family member making the claim, not to the injured person or a decedent’s estate.

The claim requires a mutually dependent relationship. Under UJI 13-1810A NMRA, the claimant must show that both people relied on the relationship and could not enjoy life in the same way after the injury. Factors that may be considered include how long the relationship lasted, the degree of mutual dependence, common contributions to a life together, shared experience, whether the two shared a household, their emotional reliance, their day-to-day relationship, and other factors.

Family members also often take on caregiving and lose time from work. UJI 13-1810 NMRA lists the reasonable value of a spouse’s services that the family has lost as an element of damages. Whether a family claim fits your situation turns on the relationship and the facts of your family’s life.

How New Mexico Fault Rules and Time Limits Affect Recovery

New Mexico uses pure comparative negligence, so being partly at fault does not bar recovery entirely. Under Scott v. Rizzo, New Mexico uses pure comparative negligence: an injured person’s own share of fault reduces the damages by that percentage, but does not bar recovery. The jury totals the damages, sets each side’s percentage of fault, and reduces the award by the injured person’s percentage, as UJI 13-2218 NMRA explains.

Section 37-1-8 of the New Mexico Statutes Annotated states that actions for an injury to the person or reputation of any person must be brought within three years. In favor of minors and incapacitated persons, Section 37-1-10 of the New Mexico Statutes Annotated extends the times limited for the bringing of actions by the preceding provisions of that chapter so that they have one year from and after the termination of the incapacity within which to commence those actions. Deadlines depend on the facts, including the parties involved and the timing of the injury. Early action helps because records and evidence are easier to gather while they’re fresh.

Where Compensation Can Come From: At-Fault Liability and Underinsured Motorist Coverage

Compensation can come from the at-fault person’s liability insurance, an employer in a work-related crash, or a property owner in a premises case. To recover, the injured person generally must show a duty owed to them, a breach of that duty, and that the breach was a proximate cause of the harm. Herrera v. Quality Pontiac states those elements. A proximate cause need not be the only cause.

Sometimes the at-fault driver’s insurance isn’t enough to cover serious losses. Section 66-5-301(B) of the New Mexico Statutes Annotated states that the uninsured motorist coverage described in Subsection A of that section shall include underinsured motorist coverage for persons protected by an insured’s policy. An underinsured motorist is a driver whose bodily injury liability limits, added together, are less than the injured person’s own uninsured motorist coverage limits. In that case, the injured person’s own policy may apply, subject to its terms.

Talk With El Gringo Law About Your Situation

A first conversation can help sort out which of these damages may apply to your situation. If you’re in a hospital or rehab room, managing a family member’s care, or opening an insurance letter you didn’t expect, these weeks are hard. You don’t have to work through every category alone, or know every answer yet.

What damages can I recover after a spinal cord injury in New Mexico?