Who’s a possible responsible party in a birth injury case?

Bringing a child into the world is natural. It is not necessarily easy. There can be physical difficulties associated with the mother’s pregnancy. Labor can be complicated by many factors. The old African adage says it takes a village to raise a child. It seems to take nearly as large a community to deliver one.

With the number of players involved it’s possible for things to go terribly wrong during a birth at an Oregon hospital. The result can be injuries that can affect the child and the whole family for the rest of their lives. If those injuries were due to a failure to apply medically accepted standards of care, those responsible should expect to be held to account.

Those with experience in the area of birth injury medical malpractice know that blame may not rest with just the person who handled the actual delivery. The conduct of all other members of the medical village deserves to be gauged, and if there is evidence that standards were not followed, that needs to be pinpointed and called out.

Included on that list could be:

• The Hospital: There could be direct negligence on the part of the hospital or vicarious liability due to the action or inaction on the part of staff.
• Nurses: Whether the individual is a licensed practical nurse, a registered nurse, a nurse practitioner or physician’s assistant, he or she has obligations and could be liable.
• Anesthesiologists: Experts in this field acknowledge that preventing anesthesia errors depends on ensuring proper education and training of practitioners, experience, good judgment and vigilance.
• Pharmaceutical companies: The liability here may be limited to situations in which the drug maker failed to warn doctors of a drug’s possible dangers.

As this shows, there are many participants in a child’s delivery. Birth injuries could result at many points in the process and holding the right people accountable can be a challenge without an experienced attorney’s assistance.

Source: FindLaw, “Responsible Parties in Birth Injury Cases: Who Can Be Sued?” Accessed April 29, 2015