## Facts

- Eighteen-year-old Daniel Boucher was admitted to a hospital with a severely injured right hand and underwent surgery.
- During postoperative recovery, Daniel lapsed into a coma and awakened ten days later as a severely brain-damaged quadriplegic requiring lifelong care.
- Daniel’s parents, James and Torla Boucher, were present at the hospital and observed his condition before and after he awoke.
- The complaint alleged negligent medical care and sought damages on Daniel’s behalf for his injuries.
- The parents also asserted individual claims for (1) negligent infliction of emotional distress (NIED) based on witnessing their son’s catastrophic outcome and (2) loss of filial consortium for loss of their son’s society and companionship.

## Issues

1. Whether the parents alleged sufficient facts to state an NIED claim under Utah’s zone-of-danger standard.
2. Whether Utah should recognize a parental cause of action for loss of filial consortium when a child is tortiously but nonfatally injured.

## Decision

- The Utah Supreme Court affirmed dismissal of the parents’ NIED claim under Rule 12(b)(6).
- The court held the parents failed to allege they were in actual physical peril or feared for their own safety, as required by Utah’s zone-of-danger rule.
- The court affirmed dismissal of the parents’ loss-of-filial-consortium claim, declining to recognize such a cause of action for nonfatal injury to a child.

## Legal Principles

- In Utah, NIED without physical impact is recoverable only when the plaintiff was placed in actual physical peril by the defendant’s negligence and feared for the plaintiff’s own safety (zone-of-danger requirement).
- Observing injury to another person, without allegations of the observer’s own physical peril and fear, does not state an NIED claim in Utah.
- Utah does not recognize a parental claim for loss of filial consortium based on a child’s nonfatal tort injury; any expansion of consortium liability is treated as a policy matter not adopted by the court in this case.

## Conclusion

The court affirmed dismissal of the parents’ individual claims, holding that Utah’s NIED doctrine requires allegations of the plaintiff’s own physical peril and fear, and declining to create a parental loss-of-filial-consortium action for a child’s nonfatal injury.


Boucher v. Dixie Med. Ctr., 850 P.2d 1179 (Utah 1992)