Loss of consortium compensates the relationship an injury damaged, not the injury itself. It belongs to the family member, not the injured person, and it is a separate claim with its own proof and its own limits.
What it actually covers
The term is often assumed to mean only the loss of a physical relationship. That is one element, but the claim is broader: companionship, affection, comfort, moral support, shared activities, and the practical services a partner provided around the home. A spouse who has become a full-time carer has lost a partnership and gained a job, and the claim is meant to reach that.
Who can bring it
Nearly everywhere it is available to a legal spouse. Beyond that it narrows sharply and varies by state:
- Parents for an injured child — recognised in some states, often only for serious injury.
- Children for an injured parent — recognised in fewer states still.
- Unmarried partners — generally not recognised, however long the relationship, which remains a real gap.
Timing matters too: the relationship usually has to have existed at the time of the injury, so marrying afterwards does not typically create the claim.
It is derivative — and that has consequences
The claim depends on the injured person’s claim succeeding. If the defendant is not liable, there is nothing to attach to. It also inherits the reductions: if the injured spouse is found partly at fault, that finding generally reduces the consortium award too. See comparative and contributory negligence.
Two other practical points. Consortium is non-economic, so where a state caps non-economic damages the consortium award may be squeezed — and in some states it shares a single cap with the injured person’s award rather than having its own. And because it is derivative, a release signed by the injured person can, depending on wording and state law, extinguish it.
Proving it, and the cost of bringing it
Proof is specific and personal: what the relationship involved before, what changed, what the spouse now does instead. Generalities carry little weight; concrete detail does.
The trade-off is privacy. Bringing the claim opens the relationship to discovery — its history and stability become fair subjects for questioning, and counselling records can come into issue. Some families decide the intrusion is not worth the additional recovery, and that is a legitimate decision rather than a weakness in the claim.
Related: Suffering, wrongful death and survival actions.
General information only, not legal advice. Who may bring a consortium claim, and how caps apply to it, are state-law questions.