Ordered that the judgment is affirmed, with costs.
At the trial of this action arising from a chain-reaction automobile collision in which the plaintiff was a passenger in the third of five automobiles, the trial court properly submitted the "seat belt defense" to the jury inasmuch as the respondents had demonstrated, through an engineer properly qualified as an expert, "a causal connection between the plaintiff's nonuse of an available seat belt and the injuries and damages sustained" (Spier v. Barker, 35 N.Y.2d 444, 450).
Moreover, the court properly exercised its discretion in temporally limiting the plaintiff's recovery for conscious pain and suffering to that period for which corroboration by a certified medical record existed, in the absence of expert medical testimony with respect thereto (see, Shaw v. Tague, 257 N.Y. 193; Hoffman v. Ryan, 101 Misc.2d 845).
We have examined the remainder of the plaintiff's claims, consisting of challenges to evidentiary rulings and the charge, and find them to be without merit. Bracken, J.P., Weinstein, Rubin and Sullivan, JJ., concur.