There are few medical events in life in which more things must go exactly right in order for a process to be completed safely and properly than that of childbirth. Not only are mothers vulnerable to harm during this difficult process, but the infants are exposed to several different risks that they will be unable to avoid without the help of medical professionals who are overseeing their entries into the world. Unfortunately, it appears that the number of infants who are forced to endure harm as a result of severe complications that arise during birth is rising quickly.
The United States Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, or the CDC, recently completed a long and thorough study of the rates of severe birth complications in the United States, and the results were not good. Below you will find a brief overview of these results. Anyone whose child has suffered a serious birth injury that occurred because of the negligence of those handling the delivery needs to seek the help of experienced New York medical malpractice lawyers as soon as possible.
The CDC Study of Severe Birth Complications
The CDC studied births that occurred in the United States between the years of 1998 and 2009. The researchers looked at the rate at which serious birth complications arose during that timeframe, and unfortunately that rate skyrocketed during those years. Specifically, the CDC found that 129 cases of severe complications arose for every 10,000 hospital births in 2008 and 2009. That represented a 75 percent increase from the rate that existed in 1998. In addition, the rate of complications in post-delivery hospital stays by mothers more than doubled during this study.
The study generally defined ‘severe complications’ as heart attacks, kidney problems or failures, strokes and severe internal bleeding among some other things. Basically, a child’s life would have needed to have been at risk in order to be included in these statistics. The same type of threshold existed for mothers whose post-birth complications while staying in the hospital to recover were included in the data generated.
Severe Birth Complications and Medical Negligence
What the study did not include was a breakdown of the causes for these different birth complications. Some of these infants are injured or encounter trouble because of unavoidable circumstances. However, too many others arise because the medical professionals overseeing these births were negligent and failed to live up to their duties. When these situations arise, parents of a child who suffers are often unsure of what they should do to find the help they need so that those responsible for this type of harm can be held accountable.
If your child has suffered a severe birth injury that you believe was the result of negligence on the part of those who were supposed to oversee the delivery, you need to seek the help of New York medical malpractice lawyers who have been fighting for the rights of families for more than 40 years. Contact The Fitzgerald Law Firm today to schedule a free initial consultation.