The Work of a New Mexico Birth Injury Attorney
Sadly, many medical errors in the delivery room can cause serious birth injuries for infants. These injuries can cause a lifetime of care and medical expenses that deplete families' finances.
Birth injuries require the same proof requirements as other malpractice claims. The medical professional must have violated their duty to provide a reasonable medical treatment. This is a complicated task.
Preparing a Claim
The legal process for a birth injury claim begins with a thorough examination of your child's medical records. These records could contain important information that proves that the doctor was negligent. An experienced attorney will be able to determine the most crucial evidence and gather documents that you can use to support your claim.
The lawyer will also collaborate with one or more expert medical witnesses to establish that the doctor did not meet the standard of care that would be expected by medical professionals working in the same specialty. Using an expert can assist the jury in understanding how the doctor's actions or inaction led to the injuries suffered by your child.
If a medical professional can show that the injuries suffered by your child resulted from the doctor's negligence, the next step is determining what damages your child could be liable for. This includes past and future medical costs and lost earnings over the course of their lives, as well as pain and suffering.
Depending on the severity of your child's injuries, you may be entitled to damages, either punitive or exemplary. These additional damages are meant to penalize the medical professional at fault for their utter carelessness or negligence, and deter other people from acting in the same manner.
Many birth injuries are the result of medical errors during the delivery of a baby. These mistakes can occur at any point during the pregnancy but are more likely to occur during labor and delivery. If a medical professional commits error, it can lead to grave and long-lasting injuries to both the mother and baby.
The most frequent birth injuries are shoulder dystocia, brain damage spinal cord injuries, and Erb's palsy. Erb's palsy is a type of nerve damage which causes paralysis in the arm. It is usually caused by a trauma during birth to the brachial-plexus. Most often this problem can be avoided with appropriate treatment and intervention.
New Mexico law has strict laws that limit the time you must bring a lawsuit relating to medical malpractice. Your attorney will determine if your case qualifies for an exception to these deadlines. Even the case is strong the case will be dismissed if the statute of limitations has expired. To ensure that your lawsuit is filed in time, it's important to get in touch with an New Mexico attorney for birth injury as soon as you are able to.
Prepare for trial
The process of preparing for a trial begins earlier than the actual trial date, as legal teams examine the evidence and establish their theory of the case. They must then determine the witnesses and formulate their questions. They should also prepare all exhibits to be used during the trial. They will also need to prepare jury instructions. All of this is vital to make a claim that is successful, and win compensation for the victims.
A birth injury that is the result of an error by a medical professional can cause life-altering effects for a family. perinatal injury lawyer who suffer such injuries require medical attention and treatment for the rest of their lives. Families may need assistance paying for treatments, therapies, and equipment that is specialized. A skilled New Mexico birth injury attorney can help families obtain financial compensation that can help pay for these expenses.
In order to file a birth injury lawsuit, a family must prove that their doctor or medical provider failed to provide the treatment that reasonable medical professionals would have offered under similar circumstances. Medical malpractice is exactly what it is. To prove this, the victim must establish four elements that include duty of care, breach of that duty, causation, and damages.
A lot of medical mistakes that result in birth injuries are caused by simple mistakes, such as incorrect diagnosis or treatment of prenatal complications. Some are more complex such as shoulder dystocia that can cause partial or total arm paralysis. In some cases, birth injuries are only visible later in childhood, when the child is unable to complete developmental milestones.
Contacting a birth injury lawyer as early as you can after the injury is important in order to avoid the time frame when the initial statute of limitation (SOL) could expire. There are exceptions to the SOL that can prolong the time frame for filing a lawsuit. An experienced birth injury lawyer can explain the specific SOLs that apply to your particular case and recommend an appropriate time frame to file a lawsuit.
Expert testimony is typically required to demonstrate that the doctor's care fell below the standard for their area of expertise. A qualified medical malpractice firm like Miller Weisbrod Olesky is able to work with highly-respected experts across the country to prove these facts in an injury claim involving birth.
Making a Claim
If a birth injury happens, it can cause lasting and life-altering injuries to the child parents, child, and family members. A successful claim may pay for future and current medical expenses, loss of income, and pain and suffering. It could also help pay for the cost of specialized equipment and therapies. However, a successful claim requires expert medical testimony to establish that the nurse, doctor or other healthcare provider breached their duty of care and caused the child's injuries.
A New Mexico birth injury lawyer can help families receive the justice they deserve with a lawsuit against the responsible medical professional or healthcare facility. It is crucial to remember that medical malpractice lawsuits have strict statutes. An attorney can look over the specifics of the case and determine the date when the statute of limitations was set to expire, in order for legal action to be initiated before it expires.
In certain instances, doctors can be held responsible for birth injuries, even if medical negligence wasn't committed at the time of birth. This type of negligence could be due to a delay in diagnosing or treating a maternal issue or the improper use of forceps during the delivery or a failing Caesarean section.
Other causes of a birth injury are a lack of oxygen to the brain during labor or prolonged labor. A New Mexico birth injury lawyer will review the details of a case and identify potential responsible parties, including doctors, nurses and hospitals. These lawsuits are often filed against the hospital in which the negligent healthcare professional was employed.
It is not uncommon for defendant to claim that there could be other reasons for the baby's injuries for instance, the genetic defect or fetal development issues. A New Mexico birth injuries attorney can help the victim's family to counter this argument by proving the existence of evidence of medical malpractice, and that the professional's actions and inaction directly led in the child's injury.
A New Mexico birth injury lawyer at Miller Weisbrod Olesky can investigate the case and employ one or more medical experts to establish that a health care provider's decision or failure to act fell below the standard of care in a similar scenario and resulted in the child's injuries. A successful claim could result in compensation for past and future medical expenses as well as lost income, discomfort and pain, as well as other damages.
