What Are Birth Injuries?
Birth injury cases are medical malpractice cases involving injuries to newborns caused by either a failure to provide proper labor and delivery or neonatal care. The injuries are often a result of the failure to deliver the child in a timely manner when there are signs and symptoms that the fetus is unable to tolerate the uterine environment.
Sometimes this is caused by placental insufficiency or some impingement of the umbilical cord. There are many ways the fetus can deplete its reserves, develop acidosis, and fail to deliver adequate oxygen-rich blood to the brain causing permanent injury to the areas of the brain that are affected.
Many attorneys who specialize in medical malpractice cases are not prepared for the issues and defenses we confront in birth injury cases. You need an attorney who is knowledgeable and skilled in this area. We have that skill and access to the finest experts in the field to support the claims we make, whether the issue is liability or the extent of injury and medical and other future needs. Get started using our contact form to request a free consultation.
Do you need more information while you’re waiting to hear from us? As a disclaimer, the information below is not legal advice, but it should give you a better understanding of birth injury cases and the legal options.
How a Birth Injury Attorney Can Help You Through Your Family Hardship
An Atlanta birth injury attorney can help you through every stage of the claim process. At the beginning of the process, your lawyer can help you understand if you have a case and what kind of potential your case has to succeed.
If you hire one of our Atlanta birth injury lawyers to represent you, they will immediately begin building your case against the medical professionals who were responsible for the injury to your baby. It can take a long time to investigate serious birth injuries and to find witnesses and experts who can explain the consequences, such as developmental delays and nerve damage.
You may be able to claim compensation without going to trial. In cases where medical negligence is egregious, the healthcare providers or their insurance companies may be motivated to settle as quickly as possible.
If your claim goes to trial, our Atlanta birth injury lawyers will help you prepare and handle the work of explaining your child’s birth injury to a judge or jury.
Different Types of Birth Injuries
These cases are often devastating and permanent injuries causing cerebral palsy and a multitude of developmental issues that will last a lifetime. The needs of these children may cost millions in care, therapy, surgery, and life care costs that no single family could afford.
Professional membership groups such as the American College of Obstetricians/Gynecologists (ACOG) have made it their mission to protect their members from liability at the expense of these children.
Common causes of birth injuries include attempting delivery of a fetus who is large for gestational age, and should not be delivered vaginally without significant risk of shoulder dystocia (head delivered but too large to deliver the shoulder without delay). This can cause a brachial plexus injury (nerve injury to arm) or even brain injury or death.
Injury can also be caused by failure to deliver the fetus before a lack of adequate oxygenation of the brain causes injury to the watershed area of the brain (the white matter where higher thinking occurs) or the deep gray area of the brain (the deeper structures where body functions are regulated).
Injury can also occur in the neonatal period when arterial pressure is too low and the issue is not addressed before a lack of adequate pressure prevents the delivery of oxygen-rich blood to vital brain tissue. Not every case of birth injury results from neglect.
Sometimes other causes are beyond the power of the physicians and nurses to prevent. You need an attorney who understands medicine and standards of care; they can determine whether your child’s injury occurred as a result of failures in medical and hospital care.
FAQs About Birth Injury Claims in Georgia
If you still have more questions you want to ask before you move forward with a birth injury lawsuit, the following answers to common questions may help you.
What is the difference between a birth defect and a birth injury?
Birth injuries are often caused by trauma during the birthing process. Birth defects only develop when the child is in utero during pregnancy.
What are the most common locations of birth injuries?
The following are some of the most common injuries:
Swelling or bruising of the head
Bleeding underneath one of the cranial bones
Breakage of small blood vessels in the eyes
Facial nerve injury caused by pressure
Injury to the group of nerves that supplies the arms and hands
Fracture of the clavicle or collarbone
What parties are often responsible for birth injuries?
Medical errors can be made during the birthing process by any medical professional who is involved in the birth. Doctors, hospitals, nurses, anesthesiologists, and other medical experts are all capable of contributing to mistakes that result in a birth injury. Determining the party responsible for birth injury cases can be complicated.
Contact Our Team of Birth Injury Attorneys
As Atlanta’s medical malpractice firm, we do our best to support every client who is struggling with the tragedy of a birth injury. We want to work with you to ensure that any mistakes by healthcare providers don’t happen to another child. Make sure you exercise your right to file before the statute of limitations expires.
Get started now using our birth injury contact form. Fill out some basic contact information and leave some details about what happened. If our medical malpractice attorneys can help, we’ll invite you for a free case evaluation.
Our law firm has years of experience, and we’ve worked with many kinds of birth injuries in the past, including those that resulted in brain damage, Erb’s palsy, birth canal complications, or other disabilities. We also support parents who have suffered wrongful deaths.
