Tons of birth injuries can cause serious or long-term conditions in either the delving parent or infant. Avoiding these during the delivery is key to ensuring a child is delivered successfully. When these seven birth injuries occur, they can lead families to file birth injury lawsuits against the responsible parties:
1. Fractures
Fractures are much more common than people realize during delivery. This complication tends to affect the collarbone rather than any other area of the infant’s body (although exceptions do happen). The collarbone tends to break when there’s trouble during the baby’s breech delivery. Doctors are well-prepared to handle any fracture-related complications during birth, however, so these injuries rarely become complicated further. The fact that infants can quickly heal from minor fractures helps to make this less bothersome for new parents as well. When an infant is harmed by a preventable fracture during delivery, however, a birth injury claim could be filed against the responsible medical pro or hospital.
2. Cephalohematoma
There are a large number of cephalohematoma-related complications that happen during delivery every year. Cephalohematoma is defined as injuries that cause bleeding between the infant’s skull and the fibrous covering that protects the infant’s brain. While cephalohematoma tends to be easy to fix and tends to fade out naturally over a few weeks, it can cause further complications in rare cases. Typically, if an infant experiences complications from cephalohematoma, they will develop jaundice as their red blood cells break down at a hyper-fast rate.
3. Brachial Palsy
Brachial palsy is one of the most infamous birth-related injuries infants can be affected by when a group of nerves connected to the arms and hands are injured, the brachial plexus occurs, and this can lead to the full-on development of brachial palsy. Compared to the injuries we’ve covered so far, brachial palsy is much more inherently serious and can easily lead to life-long and debilitating complications. Brachial palsy will limit the infant’s mobility later in life and can cause the arms and hands affected to not develop properly. Because of the damage birth-injury-related brachial palsy can cause, it’s more commonly pointed toward as an origin for high-profile birth injury lawsuits.
4. Subconjunctival Hemorrhage
When an infant is exposed to a high level of pressure during delivery, they can develop subconjunctival haemorrhages (defined as breakage of small blood vessels in the infant’s eye). While this can look shocking and will strike fear in the hearts of the baby’s parents, subconjunctival haemorrhages tend to be fairly easy to treat, and many infants that suffer the condition do not suffer from any further medical complications. When complications do occur, however, it can cause the eye to be irreparably damaged. Some infants that are afflicted by subconjunctival haemorrhages will develop vision issues earlier in life, but this is not always the case.
5. Facial Paralysis
One of the more serious injuries that can occur during delivery, facial paralysis, can cause immediate problems with an infant’s ability to breathe and regulate its eyes’ moisture levels. For this reason, any instance of facial paralysis needs to be tackled by the delivering doctors immediately. Doing so can help prevent dangerous and debilitating complications from occurring later on, after all. Facial paralysis is typically caused by excessive bruising, pressure, or blood vessel bursts during the delivery process. However, there are plenty of safety precautions put in place to make facial paralysis injuries rare during the delivery process.
6. Caput Succedaneum
When a baby’s scalp is significantly damaged during delivery, either by the delivery path or by delivery tools, it can suffer from intense swelling, known as caput succedaneum. The baby will experience a high level of pain by this condition, but caput succedaneum tends to resolve itself on its own, making the chances of further complications rather low. Delivery vacuum extraction methods are the main cause of caput succedaneum during delivery. For this reason, if an infant is in a fragile state, this extraction method is less likely to be used.
7. Prolonged Labor
Not all birth injuries relate to the child and instead affect the delivering parent. Prolonged labor that’s caused by negligent medical practices can lead to birth injury lawsuits in a heartbeat. The nature of delivery is incredibly painful and dangerous for the birthing parent, so when labor is pushed onto a longer timeline than necessary, medical workers can be held accountable for their negligence. If the hospital admin causes the prolonged labor to happen, the medical facility may become the target of the affected parent’s birth injury lawsuit instead.