Injured Kiwi tramper Claire Nelson's 'stomach-knotting' insurance worries

Claire Nelson in her hospital bed in Palm Springs after an operation she had to repair her fractured pelvis. Photo / Twitter

A Kiwi expat who smashed her pelvis while hiking in a US desert has had surgery to repair the injury but says her stomach is in knots due to worries about medical bills.

Claire Nelson was forced to drink her own urine to fight dehydration as she lay in agony for three days after falling seven metres from a boulder in California's Joshua Tree National Park before she was rescued on Friday last week (local time).

She is now recovering in hospital in Palm Springs.

While the 35-year-old freelance writer and copy editor is grateful to be alive and for the "amazing skilled physicians and nurses" treating her, "the payment side of things, however, is a whole other story", she said in a tweet posted this morning.

"Having insurance is more of a polite buffer than total cover. There are no set costs for treatments. No general quotation. Nobody can tell me what the price of my CT Scan is, for instance. For that reason it becomes a scary healing process."

Nelson, who is originally from Auckland, said she wished she could dedicate all her focus and energy to healing and learning to walk again but was spending about 60 per cent of her time on "in-bed phone calls and stomach-knotting worries about insurance and bills".

Surgeons had put pins in her pelvis to reconnect the broken pieces so they could fuse together again.

However, Nelson still faces a long road ahead in her recovery.

Although she can stand on one foot for about a minute at a time with the help of a walker it will likely be months before she can use her left leg.

A Go Fund me page set up to raise money for Nelson's treatment and rehabilitation has amassed US$21,940 (NZ$31,419.18) towards its US$30,000 goal.

Nelson's mother Maggie Hickton, who lives in Otaki, has travelled to the US to be at her daughter's bedside.

Hickton previously told the Herald on Sunday Nelson's harrowing tale of survival had stunned rescuers and medical staff.

"She's actually in good spirits but she's still in shock," Hickton said last week.

New Zealand tramper Claire Nelson was found alive three days after she fell and smashed her pelvis while hiking in a US national park. Photo / File

"She's gone through all those thoughts about thinking she's going to die."

Nelson was thinking, "nobody knows where I am, nobody's going to know I'm missing", but she needed to "hang on " and hope someone would save her, Hickton said.

She had almost given up hope when she heard a rescue helicopter buzzing overhead, with searchers calling her name over a megaphone. She successfully signalled to the crew by waving a t-shirt and hat tied to a stick.

Kiwi survival expert Ian Barnes praised Nelson's ability to keep enough of a clear head to survive about 72 hours in such unforgiving conditions.

The rugged Joshua Tree National Park Lost Oasis Trail, where Claire Nelson was rescued after falling and breaking her pelvis. Photo / File