A woman just delivered of a baby is entitled to seek compensation for birth injuries caused by medical malpractice. We have heard lots of situations in the past few years about babies being injured by doctors during delivery, and the parents of the new babies never did anything to fight for justice. One of the reasons we were told was that some of the owners of these children never did anything because they do not have the idea of how to go about the whole process. This is why we have come together to explain everything concerning medical negligence involving a child injured during birth and the possible ways to deal with it when it happens to you or someone you know.
The Various Ways a Child Can Be Injured During Birth
The lists of injuries we will discuss are the common ones.
- – A child can damage his/her brain during birth: as a result of medical negligence, a child can have a brain injury. We will be explaining various ways brain injury can occur in a child during birth.
- The first one is cerebral hemorrhage: This has to do with bleeding in the brain.
- The second one is interventricular hemorrhage: this occurs when blood uncontrollably gushes out in the area we have the spinal fluids located. A child born with low or given birth to too early is very likely to have this type of brain injury.
- The third one is subarachnoid hemorrhage: babies bleeding within the area of the arachnoid membrane and the cover of the brain have this brain injury.
- The fourth is cephalohematoma: A child bleeding within the area of the skull and the cover of the skull has this brain injury. This brain disorderliness can lead to a bump on the head, and this could take about two weeks to many months to heal.
- The last on this subheading is perinatal asphyxia: a child could have mental and physical issues during the time of labor and delivery as a result of lack of oxygen or blood to the brain of the child. This bad health condition could become worse if the brain of the child is left without oxygen for a long time before giving medical attention to it. Things like death, difficulty in breathing, shock, seizure, etc. can happen to the child if not taken proper care of.
- – The peripheral nerve of a child can also get damaged during birth: this birth injury is also known as brachial plexus injury. This may not allow the child affected to be able to move his/her arm and hand.
- Birth injuries like damage to the cranial nerve and the spinal cord can also affect a child during birth as a result of medical negligence: when a doctor or any other medical practitioner in charge of the delivery of a child becomes careless in rotating, pulling or stretching the baby, this type of birth injury is most likely to occur. This can result in a child having his/her face paralyzed. It could even get worse by extending beyond the facial part of the body.
- The fourth birth injury we will discuss here is brain fractures: this can occur during breech births. It could also happen when the babies appear larger sizes. Clavicles, among the 300 soft bones of a baby, can easily break during birth as a result of medical negligence of the medical personnel in charge of the delivery. The 300 bones of babies get fused and become only about 206 as they grow and develop into adults.
The last on the list is intra-abdominal wound: this birth injury does not frequently occur in babies during birth, but we cannot overlook it by not explaining what it means. This damage affects the liver and other internal organs of the baby severely.
Immediately you discover any of the aforementioned birth injuries in your baby, contact medical practitioners to help find solutions to them because virtually all of them can be corrected when are given immediate attention. The other part is for you to hire a competent and reliable attorney, which you might have confirmed is experienced in dealing with medical negligence relating to a child injured during birth if you feel that’s the cause of the abnormality.
Some Important Factors that Could Trigger Injuries During the Birth of a Baby
Some certain things might have shown during pregnancy or labor that could lead to an infant having injuries. Immediate and serious attention must be given to the factors that will be explaining shortly here to prevent unhealthy conditions in infants just given birth to.
- – A medical doctor must be ready to control macrosomia in infants: the word macrosomia can be related to new babies if they abnormally outgrow in size at the very early state of their lives.
- – Lengthy labor
- – The uterus of the mother is unable to handle vaginal birth
- – There is also a danger if a child is early given birth to
- – There is also something to be worried about if a medical practitioner makes use of forceps or a vacuum in taking away a baby from the vaginal canal
- – When delivery is performed in a nontraditional position
- – Pulling or stressing an infant too much during the process of delivery the new baby from the mother
Contact the Best Medical Negligence Lawyer for Your Case
It is to your good advantage to do thorough research work in choosing the best medical negligence lawyer to stand on your behalf in handling cases related to birth injuries. This attorney you are considering hiring must be having a lot of experience in the concerned subject of matter. The high demand for lots of experience is because this particular part of law is very delicate in handling. We have had lots of overlap between medical and legal matters, and there are also distinctive technical matters that happen in medical negligence cases.
The Correct Way in Building a Strong Birth Injury Claim
Medical negligence can be said to have happened if a medical practitioner digresses from the “medical standard of care in the community.” The newly born baby or the mother is negatively affected in cases like this. When this happens to you, the next thing for you is to go to a reliable and credible law firm to hire yourself an expert lawyer to help you fight against the unprincipled act done by a careless medical doctor.
In Medical Negligence law, it is either a lawyer defends doctors from medical malpractice suits or the lawyer stands on behalf of a patient that has been affected by one of the unprofessional acts found in the line of medical practice.
My advice to you is to hire an attorney that has stood in for both medical practitioners and patients in the past. This will be of good advantage to you because the lawyer could be very aware of the plans and strategy of the opposition.
Once you have followed this, there is a huge chance for you and your hired attorney to win the case.
Necessary Things You Must Be Ready to Tell
We will be listing to you some important things you and your lawyer must be ready to present as proof that your child has just suffered a birth injury as a result of medical negligence. These things are:
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- – You must be ready to show that the doctor, midwife or medical facility owed you a duty of care
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- – You also be prepared to present the normal child delivery process contained in the medical standard of care to how it is entirely different from what was given to you
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- – The causes or the reason why the medical negligence in relation to how it violated the standard of care must also be presented too
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- – You also state that deviancy from the medical standard of care was the main reason behind the woeful incident
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- – The injuries you and your newly born baby sustained during the course of the child delivery process must be shown too
The damages a Child can Sustain during Delivery Process Includes:
- the pain and distress suffered by the child
- the parents’ emotional pains
- the costs of therapy and rehabilitation
- the money spent on medical care
- the cost of peculiar medical equipment such as wheelchairs, ventilators, etc.
Our Final Thoughts
Now that we all know what to do if a child is injured during birth as a result of medical negligence, everybody must be willing, bold, and ready to kick this act away from our societies. We should all be ready to act fast when things like these happen to us or someone very close to us. The act of making a lawsuit against medical personnel concerning medical negligence will make one way or the other put our health care practitioners to check. No one really loves to be penalized for wrongdoings. So this might make some of them that are acting unprofessionally to rethink and retrace their path back to the right ways of the medical field.