- $4,000,000 Brain Injury-Pretrial Settlement (Illinois): After a woman goes into labor, doctors will monitor the baby’s heart rate. This is called fetal heart rate monitoring. If the baby gets in trouble during labor-has trouble getting oxygen-the baby’s heart rate will change. Doctors and nurses are trained to watch for these changes. If these changes are serious and persistent, they are required to get the baby out, usually by caesarean section as quickly as possible. In this case, the baby began to show signs of distress-she was being deprived of oxygen-but these signs were missed, delaying the baby’s delivery. As a result, the baby was deprived of oxygen and suffered severe brain injury. Brain injuries like this are called, cerebral palsy.
- $2,500,000 Brain Injury-Pretrial Settlement (Georgia): In many cases, newborns will develop yellow skin and yellow eyes. This condition is called jaundice, which is caused by a substance in the blood called bilirubin. Jaundice is very common in babies, and usually goes away on its own. Occasionally, however, a baby has problems getting rid of bilirubin. If this substance is allowed to build up, it can cause severe brain damage (called, kernicterus). Reducing bilirubin, even in babies who have a hard time getting rid of it, is actually very easy-if the excess ( hyperbilirubinemia) is promptly recognized. In this case, a little baby boy could not clear bilirubin on his own. Unfortunately, his doctor failed to recognize the excess and didn’t treat it until the boy suffered severe brain injury.
- $2,000,000 Brain Injury-Pretrial Settlement (Arizona): Pitocin is a drug doctors use to induce contractions in a mother, to speed up the birth of a baby. However, as usual, too much of a good thing is almost always bad. Too much Pitocin will cause the mother to have too many contractions; too many contractions will put a baby at risk by not giving her enough oxygen between contractions. That is why doctors and hospitals are required to monitor the baby closely whenever Pitocin is used. In this case, they didn’t, and the baby girl was born with severe brain injury.
- $1,500,000 Brain Injury Lawsuit-Pretrial Settlement (Georgia): This is, unfortunately, a common story. A woman is in labor, the baby gets distressed (starts to lack oxygen) and the doctor misses or ignores the signs, waits too long to get the baby out, and the baby is born with severe brain injury.
- $1,350,000 Pretrial Settlement (Georgia): A baby was born with a brain hemorrhage. The hemorrhage was caused by a condition called neonatal alloimmune thrombocytopenia (NAIT) which destroyed the baby’s blood platelets in utero. The mother’s prior baby experienced the same condition. Once NAIT appears in one baby, it is almost guaranteed to appear in the next. Since the condition was known, the hemorrhage and brain damage in the second baby was predictable and preventable.
If you have suffered a serious injury caused by medical malpractice, or a loved one has been seriously injured or died, we invite you to contact our firm and talk to one of our physician attorneys about whether a lawsuit would protect your best interests.
