3 Questions About What to Do after Having Traumatic Labor in the Hospital
While the birth of a child is supposed to be an exciting and happy time, a problem during labor can make it very traumatic. If you suffered a preventable birth injury, you may be wondering what your options are under the rules of the law.
1. How Can You Tell If Birth Trauma Was Preventable?
From a patient's perspective that has never given birth before, it is hard to know what went right and wrong during labor and delivery. This is especially true because delivering a baby can be painful, leaving you with many questions about what happened.
Be mindful of the instruments used to deliver the baby. While your doctor may need to use forceps, you should ask yourself if it seems as if it was necessary to do so. If your anesthesia did not seem to work, you should ask yourself if it seemed due to an error from the anesthesiologist or equipment failure. Don't be afraid to ask questions, even days after the birth.
2. How Are Traumatic Birth Cases Investigated?
An attorney can help gather all of the records during the birth, which includes the fetal monitoring strips. This can help tell the story of the wellbeing of the fetus, even though you were unable to tell what was going on at the time. These medical records are kept by the hospital and should be easy for an attorney to request on your behalf, but the laws vary by each state for how long hospitals must hold onto these records. It is always in your best interest to act quickly so that records can be obtained without issue.
3. How Do You Know if the Doctor Caused Negligence?
It can be very difficult trying to figure out on your own if your baby has a birth defect or if the injury was preventable. That is why an attorney will often bring in experts in these types of cases to evaluate the injury. Based on their history of working with these cases, they can help determine if you have a valid case after examining the records that they can obtain.
If you are not sure what steps to take after the traumatic birth that you went through, know that you can always meet with a birth defect attorney for a consultation. They'll review your case and let you know if it is worth moving forward to pursue legal action.
