Fractures and broken bones
A fracture is the one injury nobody argues about. It is on the X-ray. The dispute moves instead to what happens after it heals — and that is where most of these claims leak value.
Why the simple ones are not always simple
The distinctions that matter are not the ones people expect. A "simple break" that involves a joint surface can be far more consequential than a dramatic-sounding shaft fracture.
| Displaced vs non-displaced | Whether the bone ends moved out of alignment. Displaced fractures frequently need surgical reduction and fixation. |
|---|---|
| Comminuted | Broken into several pieces. Longer healing, higher complication rate, more hardware. |
| Open (compound) | Bone broke the skin. A surgical emergency because of infection risk, and a different claim entirely. |
| Intra-articular | The fracture line crosses a joint surface. This is the one that matters most, because even perfectly repaired joint surfaces commonly develop post-traumatic arthritis years later. |
The costs that come later
- Hardware removal. Plates, screws, rods and nails are often removed in a second operation months or years later. It is a foreseeable future surgery and belongs in the claim.
- Post-traumatic arthritis, particularly after intra-articular fractures of the ankle, wrist, knee or hip. It can appear five or ten years on and may lead to joint replacement.
- Non-union and malunion, requiring bone grafting or corrective osteotomy.
- Permanent loss of range of motion, measured and documented by a specialist, which is what converts "it healed" into a quantified permanent impairment.
- Hardware that aches in cold weather — minor sounding, genuinely lifelong.
- Complex regional pain syndrome, an uncommon but devastating complication after limb fractures. See chronic pain and CRPS.
Fractures in older adults
A hip fracture in an older adult is not an orthopedic inconvenience; it is a sentinel event with well-documented consequences for independence and mortality. The same is true of a proximal humerus fracture that ends someone's ability to live alone.
Insurers reliably undervalue these by arguing the person was frail already or had osteoporosis. The eggshell plaintiff principle answers it directly: the defendant takes the victim as they find them. A fall that would have bruised a 30-year-old and shattered a 78-year-old's hip is valued on what it actually did.
Questions people ask
My bone healed. Is the claim over?
Not necessarily. Hardware often has to be removed in a later operation, fractures involving a joint surface commonly lead to arthritis years afterwards, and permanent loss of motion is measurable and compensable. Ask your surgeon what the long-term outlook is for your specific fracture before anything is settled.
They say my osteoporosis caused the break, not the fall.
California applies the eggshell plaintiff rule: a defendant takes the victim as they find them, including their bone density. If the fall caused the fracture, the fact that stronger bone might have survived it is not a defense.
Should I have the hardware taken out?
That is a decision for you and your surgeon. For the claim, what matters is that a recommended or likely future removal is documented as a future cost, whether or not you have had it yet.
Related
Reviewed October 2026 by Simon Aziz Budhwani, Esq., the attorney responsible for this site. Legal statements here name the California code section they rely on, so you can check them rather than trust them. This is information about the law in general, not advice about your situation.
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