What is a Maternal Injury & How Does It Happen?

Birth injuries are a form of medical malpractice that occurs when an unborn child, newborn, or infant suffers an injury due to the negligence of a medical provider. Maternal injuries are similar in that they usually happen during, shortly before, or shortly after labor, except the injuries are suffered by the mother, not the child. As with birth injuries, maternal injuries are often the end result of medical malpractice or negligence.

Common forms of maternal injuries include:

• Uterine ruptures
• Vaginal tears
• Anal fissures
• Excessive bleeding
• Infections
• Preeclampsia
• Unsafe C-sections
• Episiotomies

While some of these maternal injuries can be less severe than others, they all have the potential to cause serious complications and endanger the mother’s health. Without appropriate and immediate medical attention, the harm done by a maternal injury can be dramatic, permanent, and/or life-threatening.

How Do Maternal Injuries Happen?

Labor is an intensive process for the mother, her child, and the medical professionals assisting with the birth. Due to the stress and complications of the situation, medical providers can be more prone to mistakes and errors. A high-stress procedure is not an excuse for a medical professional to make serious and avoidable mistakes, though.

Mistakes medical providers might make that cause a maternal injury are:

• Delaying a C-section or never performing one when necessary
• Failing to clean and disinfect a C-section incision
• Not inducing labor when the mother’s health is in crisis
• Pulling too forcefully on a child during delivery
• Misusing medical equipment like forceps
• Confusing patient records
• Assisting with a delivery while exhausted or distracted
• And more

Can You Sue for a Maternal Injury?

Yes, injured mothers have the right to sue a medical practitioner and possibly the hospital that hired them for causing a maternal injury. The process of forming a maternal injury claim will be similar to creating a birth injury claim, such as there will be a need for good medical evidence that something went wrong that should have been avoided.

Maternal injury attorneys will often seek the assistance of a medical expert to provide insight and testimony. In fact, without a medical expert’s contributions to a maternal injury claim, a court might be tempted to dismiss a claim before it even has time to develop. Hiring a medical expert to act as a special witness can be expensive, especially for maternal injury cases that involve highly specific injury types that most medical practitioners will not know about. For this reason alone, it is a good idea to work with a professional lawyer if you need to file a maternal injury claim against a medical provider or medical group.

Maternal Injury Claims in Buffalo, New York

Faraci Lange, LLP provides comprehensive and compassionate legal assistance to injured mothers and their families. If your life has been turned upside-down by a maternal injury that should have been preventable, then we want to hear from you to see what we can do to assist you. There could be an opportunity for you to file a maternal injury claim or lawsuit in pursuit of fair compensation.