Compensation for Surviving Family

Parents can make a claim for their own personal losses when their child is killed or injured in Iowa. These types of claims are commonly referred to as loss of consortium, services, and support, or sometimes simply consortium claims.  If a child is killed these claims typically are made along with the underlying estate’s claim in a wrongful death action unless it is not feasible to do so for some reason.

Parental Claims and Damages.

When a minor child is killed or injured, a parent can bring an action for loss of consortium and services.  Until relatively recently however, parents of an adult child were not allowed to make such a claim.  This changed in 2007 when the legislature amended the Iowa code to allow parents to bring claims for the death of an adult child as well.  Note that parents are still not allowed to make a claim under Iowa law for injuries to an adult child no matter how severe.

1. Loss of consortium- Parental consortium refers to a parent’s loss of the intangible benefits of the parent child relationship such as companionship, cooperation, aid and affection.  Like pain and suffering, there is no mathematical formula to calculate these losses.  However, these losses are valued significantly by Iowa juries and can and have led to very substantial verdicts.  In fact GRL law has obtained 3 of the 5 highest ever reported verdicts for adult-child consortium claims in Iowa. 
2. Loss of Support- Parents are also entitled to the economic value of the loss of the child’s services which includes both the amount the child could have earned outside the home as well as the value of the child’s labor inside the home. 
3. Other damages- Parents are also entitled to compensations for medical bills and burial expenses as well if they incur those expenses

Children's Claims and Damages

In addition to claims for their own injuries, children may also make a claim for the injuries to and/or death of their parents.  This is called a child's loss of consortium.  "Consortium" is the legal term used to describe the services and companionship that go along with the parent-child relationship.  The younger a child is when their parent is injured or killed, the more valuable this claim may become becuase they are deprived of that relationship for that much longer.  While it is difficult to put a value on a relationship that most of us would characterize as "priceless," the law allows a child to be compensated for their loss to the extent that a monetary figure can be placed on the loss. 

While nothing is better then getting things back to the way they were before an injury or death, making sure the responsible party is held legally responsible is one step in the right direct.