Adjusting life with a newborn child is a difficult task, especially if the child has a birth injury. A birth injury disturbs the whole family emotionally as well as financially. In addition, the child with a birth injury has to suffer for the next few years or even for the whole life. To end this agony of birth injury and the resulting difficulties, you can file a medical malpractice claim against the healthcare workers. The claim cannot cure the medical problems, but it will help you compensate for the financial needs of your child. Moreover, there are 28,000 infants born each year with birth injuries. You can hold irresponsible healthcare workers accountable for their actions by filing a birth injury claim. Hence, your claim can prevent other families as well from birth injury’s pain. In this article, you will find complete details about the procedure of birth injury lawsuits and their benefits.
What is a Birth Injury Lawsuit?
A birth injury lawsuit is a legal action that helps families compensate their child’s medical expenses due to birth injury. Legal action is taken against individual healthcare providers or birthing centers that caused the birth injury.
Don’t forget that there is a time limit to file a birth injury case known as the statute of limitations. This time limit varies in different states, and you cannot file a birth injury lawsuit after the time limit is expired. You must hurry up because the sooner you file a birth injury lawsuit, the better. Before that, you must understand the different types of birth injury lawsuits.
To determine the best line of action for pursuing compensation, consult a daycare injury lawyer.
- Medical Malpractice Lawsuit
When the physician breaches the standard of care while birthing or neglects his duty, the results can be dangerous for your child. They may receive severe birth injuries, which can even lead to permanent disability. These claims are solved through medical malpractice lawsuits.
- Wrongful Death Lawsuit
Some birth injuries are so critical that they can even take the life of the children. If your child had died during the labor process due to carelessness, you would have to file a wrongful death lawsuit.
Birth Injury Lawsuit Process
Birth injury lawsuits are different from other types of legal cases. If you have decided to file a case against the responsible party, let’s talk about the procedure of a birth injury lawsuit.
- Case Review
Before hiring a lawyer, you have to check if you are eligible to file a birth injury lawsuit. To do this, you can consult any available law firms that provide free case reviews. You will even find many of them providing their services online.
- Hire a Lawyer
You should try your best to hire a skilled lawyer who has expertise in birth injury cases. Don’t worry about their fees because many of them won’t charge until you have got the compensation.
- Send a Demand Letter
The next step is to send a demand letter to the responsible party before filing the birth injury lawsuit. Simply tell them how their negligence resulted in birth injury and how much compensation you need. If they do agree to your terms and conditions, you could receive compensation without having to file a lawsuit. However, if they don’t, you will have to keep fighting.
- Gather Evidence
To receive the payout, you must have to prove that the physician breached the standard of care that resulted in your child’s birth injury. You must have to prepare the following documents as your evidence:
- Lab tests performed before, during, and after the birthing process
- Physician notes and other medical records
- Current medical report of your child
- File The Lawsuit
Finally, your lawyer will file the lawsuit, and the trial will begin. It can take almost six months to 1 year for the lawsuit to finish.
Benefits of Birth Injury Lawsuit
According to a TDC Group study,$1 Million is the average payout in birth injury lawsuits for children under one month.This shows that birth injury lawsuits can help you compensate for your damages. However, the payout will not undo your sufferings or correct your child’s medical condition but will help to relieve the financial burden. In addition, the benefits of birth injury lawsuits are:
- The compensation will help you pay their past, present, and future medical expenses
- The payout will help for their special education, special equipment, and speech therapies
- It will bring you a sense of justice, and you have done whatever you can do for your child
- Your claim will be a lesson for negligent healthcare workers that will prevent future tragedies.
- The compensation will ensure that your child has the care they need for the future
- Don’t forget the pain and suffering you and your child had faced. A successful birth injury claim also pays for the mental anguish and physical trauma you have to go through and the lost quality or enjoyment of life.
- Settlement Over Trail
Right now, the settlement must be your top priority because a birth injury lawsuit is difficult, expensive, and time-consuming. Filing a lawsuit should not be the priority because it is likely you want to focus on your child’s care. Almost 95% of the lawsuits are resolved through settlements rather than trials.
So, you should send a demand letter and present your conditions. Moreover, birth injury settlements include a non-disclosure agreement which will help if you want to keep your child’s medical condition private. Not only this, but it will also reduce your time, money, and effort.
A child’s birth is supposed to be the happiest moment of the parents’ lives. But medical malpractice or poor decision by physicians can make a huge loss for your family. It’s simply unacceptable that you have to pay for the mistakes of healthcare providers when they have also ruined your child’s life. Birth injury lawsuits give you the chance to fight for justice against those healthcare providers. So, you must file a medical malpractice claim against them so you can receive the compensation that is needed to provide your child with all the facilities they need.
