Finding out about the birth injury can be very traumatizing. The news can ruin your dreams of filling your heart and home with the sweet cries of your child. Instead, dark clouds of dejection and hopelessness start hovering, and parents experience tumultuous emotions of sorrow and grief. You are constantly thinking about your child’s life, how they will survive, or will they be able to play with kids, go to school, and live everyday life. Uncertainty makes you lose your ability to think.
While having these thoughts after such a gruesome setback is natural, you cannot lose sight of the reality that you have to arrange for your baby’s treatment. Birth injury treatments are often costly and needed for an extended time. In some cases, babies have to stay with the birth injury their entire life, so the treatment goes side-by-side.
Fortunately, the law empowers you to hold the culprits of your baby’s birth injury responsible and demand compensation through a birth injury claim. But there is a lot you must know before proceeding with legal action against the hospital or the medical staff.
- Know The Settlement Amount You Can Get With Your Birth Injury Lawsuit
First, you must know if it is really worth going through the hassle of a legal proceeding and whether you will get enough to pay for the treatment. You must know about the average settlements and payouts of the birth injury claim. There is no doubt that birth injury lawsuits are often lengthy and complicated, but the result is satisfactory too. On average, parents have received around $420,500 to $510,000 in out-of-court settlements after winning their lawsuits. In some cases, the settlement amount has been more than one million dollars too.
- The Situation When You Can File A Medical Malpractice Suit
Birth injury lawsuits are a part of medical malpractice. How will you know that the injury that happened to your child was actually medical malpractice? Well, various factors surrounding your child’s situation can corroborate the fact that injury occurred due to negligence of the on-duty doctor, nurses, midwife, or other medical professionals. For instance, some doctors use force to pull out the baby during a vaginal canal birth, resulting in injury to the bronchial nerves of the baby.
A birth injury can occur due to oxygen deprivation, direct trauma, undue stretch and force, and infection. Sure signs to confirm your hunches about medical malpractice include a baby born with bluish skin, a baby needing resuscitation upon birth, and difficulty in breathing. Other signs to watch out for include onset of seizures and tremors, difficulty sucking, etc. In some cases, it might be challenging to point out negligence.
- Birth Injury Lawsuits Do Not Necessarily Have To Be Against One Party Only
You can file a birth injury lawsuit against many different entities. For instance, you can mention the hospital that failed to exercise due diligence when hiring the doctor. In other cases, the birth injury lawsuit is not against a medical professional or hospital, so it is not a medical malpractice suit. Instead, the culprits held responsible are drug companies or equipment manufacturers whose faulty equipment led to the issue. Similarly, if you took a medicine during pregnancy, which led to a congenital disability in your baby, the drug company is litigated for its negligent actions.
- The Settlement Amount Is Calculated By Factoring In Various Expenses
The direct expense of a birth injury is the cost incurred in treating your baby medically right after the diagnosis. But it is not the only expense considered when calculating the settlement amount. There are the projected future costs of your baby’s treatment as well. In most cases, your child needs birth injury treatments such as medications, therapy, and special education throughout their life. Therefore these costs are factored in too.
Moreover, one or both parents often have to leave their job to care for the kid with a birth injury. Therefore, they may be eligible to receive compensation for loss of livelihood and income too. Other factors like pain, suffering, mental agony, and loss of a chance to live a healthy life may come into play too.
- You Can Only File A Birth Injury Claim Before The Statute Of Limitations Expires
Parents of a child with a birth injury have a limited time during which they can file a birth injury claim. This allowed time window is called the “statute of limitation,” and it varies among states. Generally, the statute of limitations is from two to three years. The clock starts from the time of birth. Some people also prefer to file a medical malpractice lawsuit in a state where they still fulfill the statute of limitation. But it can be other than where you reside.
- The Birth Injury Does Not Always Happen During And After The Birth
Some people believe that they can only file the claim if the birth injury happens during and after the delivery. In reality, a birth injury can happen due to events that transpired during the pregnancy. For instance, if your gynecologist failed to diagnose a condition such as gestational diabetes or hypertension, leading to birth injuries in your child, you can still file the claim.
Many people don’t file for a birth injury claim; they either feel overwhelmed or guilty about implicating a medical professional. But the issue is that birth injuries are not happening in dwindling numbers. Instead, the cases are increasing every day. Therefore, it is okay to bring injury and medical practice cases to the limelight so that other families can be cautioned. Filing a medical malpractice lawsuit is complicated. Therefore, you must know the above factors to develop a fool-proof case.