Rebuttal analysis applied to spinal cord injury litigation: methodology, deliverables, and case-specific considerations.
For a spinal cord injury the opposing report's total is usually driven by the present value of attendant care and equipment, so the review concentrates on the plan pricing: whether replacement cycles were scheduled as the plan specifies, whether each category carries an appropriate growth rate or a single blended rate, whether the life expectancy matches the medical opinions, and whether home-based and facility-based scenarios were valued consistently. The earnings component is checked for the post-injury path the work-capacity opinions support, and household services for overlap with attendant care hours already in the plan.
Critique of an opposing economic damages, valuation, or forensic accounting report for plaintiff or defense counsel. The review tests the assumptions, data sources, discount rates, worklife and life expectancy inputs, growth rates, mitigation treatment, and arithmetic behind the opposing number, identifies the errors that matter, and quantifies how the conclusion changes when they are corrected. The result supports cross-examination, a rebuttal report, or a motion directed at the reliability of the opinion.
The claim consists of lost earnings and earning capacity, measured as a total loss when the person cannot return to work or as the gap between the prior path and a sedentary or part-time alternative when they can; lost fringe benefits; the replacement value of household services across the person's life; and the present value of the life care plan, which for spinal cord injury is dominated by attendant care, wheelchair and equipment replacement cycles, supplies, home and vehicle modifications, and periodic hospitalization for complications. The drivers are the earnings and benefit history, the work-capacity opinions in the record, and a life care plan with frequencies and replacement intervals stated for each item.
We issue a rebuttal report where one is disclosed and provide deposition and trial testimony, cross-examination outlines, and support for motions directed at the opinion.
Replacement cycles compressed or extended beyond the plan's intervals, a single growth rate applied to categories with different price histories, life expectancy taken from population tables when the medical opinions differ, and attendant care hours counted again as lost household services. Each is quantified.
No. The economist tests the economic translation of the plan, not the care it prescribes. Where the plan's items are contested, the review shows the present value with and without the contested items so the fact finder can attach the number to its finding.
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