Date of consolidation (medical stabilization)
The point at which a victim's injuries have stabilized, set by medical assessment, which separates temporary from permanent losses and conditions the final valuation of a bodily injury claim.
Consolidation is the point at which injuries resulting from an accident become fixed and permanent, so that treatment is no longer needed except to prevent deterioration, and it becomes possible to assess the existence and extent of a permanent impairment. It is set by a medical expert, and its date structures the entire bodily injury compensation. Before it, temporary losses are assessed: lost earnings during time off work, temporary functional impairment, pain and suffering. After it, permanent losses: permanent functional impairment, loss of future earnings, career impact, third-party care, loss of amenity. For the insurer, the consolidation date determines when the claim can be settled definitively; before it, only advances are paid. For serious injuries, notably in children or severely injured people, consolidation may occur years after the accident, lengthening the claim's life and making its reserving uncertain. A later, medically established deterioration can reopen the file, which explains late development of bodily injury liability costs.
Textbook case: a seventeen-year-old seriously injured in a road accident is consolidated only five years later. During that period the insurer pays advances, then the final award, calculated on permanent impairment, care needs and lost career, exceeds 3 million euros, three times the initial reserve.
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