Birth Injuries the Most Tragic Medical Malpractice
Most parents will tell you that the day they had their baby was the happiest day of their life, but, sadly, many times, that joy can soon turn to horror as parents realize something is 'wrong' with their newborn baby. People often use the terms birth defects and birth injuries interchangeably but there is a difference between the two. A birth defect typically means that something occurred prior to pregnancy or during pregnancy to cause something to go wrong with the child's health and development. A birth injury means that something happened during delivery that caused the baby to be deprived of oxygen or to suffer some other injury that was the direct cause of problems during delivery. What is so unfortunate is that in many cases, the birth injury could have been avoided.
Birth injuries are often due to some fault of the doctor or other medical professional involved in the delivery of the infant. When the care that a doctor provides is considered to be substandard or less than adequate, then medical malpractice may be the claim.
Four different elements must be present in order for medical malpractice to be proven:
- Duty of care
- Breach of duty
- Injury
- Proximate cause
First, a duty of care must be shown. It must be proved that the doctor or medical professional owed you a duty meaning the doctor or medical professional was responsible for providing reasonable care. When a doctor-patient relationship exists, this element is almost always met.
The second element, breach of duty, means that the doctor did not provide the reasonable and professional care he owed to you. Just as it must be shown that a duty existed, it must also be proven that that duty was breached.
The third element of injury requires that it be proven that the breach of duty that occurred resulted in injury. The failure to provide reasonable care has to result in injury or death in order to show that there was medical malpractice.
Proximate cause means that without the negligent act itself, the injury would not have occurred. If it can be shown that you may have suffered the injury even if the doctor had not made the mistake at issue, there is no proximate cause. The injury must have been reasonably foreseeable. In other words, proximate cause exists if you would not have suffered the injury or harm had the doctor not made the mistake.
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If your loved one hurt during child birth, you may have a valid medical malpractice claim. If you live in the Dallas area of Texas, please visit the website of Polewski & Associates today.