The Work of a New Mexico Birth Injury Attorney
Unfortunately, many medical mistakes during the delivery process result in serious birth injuries for newborns. These injuries can result in the need for ongoing medical bills and care that drain families' budgets.
Birth injury claims require the same proof requirements as other malpractice claims. The medical professional must have breached their duty to provide a reasonable medical treatment. This is a difficult task.
Prepare a Claim
The legal process in a birth injury lawsuit begins with a review of your child's medical records. These documents contain a wealth of information that may demonstrate that the doctor's negligence was at fault. An experienced lawyer will be able to identify key pieces of evidence, and collect documents that you can use to support your claim.
The attorney will also work closely with one or more medical experts to prove that the doctor's actions didn't adhere to the standards of care expected by professionals in the same field. Accident Injury Lawyers can help jurors comprehend how the doctor's failure to act or actions led to the injuries of your child.
If a medical expert can establish that negligence on the part of the doctor caused the injuries to your child, the next step will be to determine the damages your child is entitled to. This will include the future and past medical expenses, lost earnings over the course of a lifetime as well as pain and suffering.
Depending on the extent of your child's injuries you could be legally entitled to damages, either punitive or exemplary. These additional damages are designed to penalize the at-fault medical professional for their carelessness or disregard and deter others from acting similarly.
Many birth injuries are the result of medical errors during the birth of the baby. These mistakes can occur at any point during the pregnancy however, they are more likely to occur during labor and birth. Medical malpractice can result in serious and long-lasting injuries for both the mother and child.
Erb's palsy, shoulder dystocia, and brain damage are some of the most frequent birth injuries. Erb's Palsy is a kind of nerve damage that causes partial or complete paralysis of the arm, and is usually caused by trauma to the brachial plexus during birth. In most cases this condition can be prevented by proper treatment and intervention.
New Mexico law has strict statutes of limitation that stipulate an imposed time limit within which you are able to make a claim for medical malpractice. Your lawyer will determine if your claim is eligible for an exception to these deadlines. If the statutes of limitations have run out, your case will be dismissed, even if you have a strong case. To ensure that your lawsuit is filed on time, it is important to get in touch with an New Mexico attorney for birth injury as early as you can.
Preparing for the Trial
Preparation for a trial begins before the trial date, as the legal teams analyze the evidence and form their theories. Then, they have to identify all witnesses and prepare questions for them. They will also have to compile all the evidence that will be used during the trial. They must also prepare jury instructions. All of this preparation is crucial to presenting a winning claim and obtaining compensation for the victims.
Birth injuries caused by an error by a medical professional can cause life-altering effects for families. Children who suffer from injuries like this require an entire lifetime of medical treatment and services. Families may require financial aid to pay for therapies, treatments, and specialized equipment. An experienced New Mexico birth injury attorney can help families recover financial compensation that can pay for these requirements.
In order to file a birth injury lawsuit the plaintiff's family must prove that their medical provider or doctor failed to provide the care that an experienced medical professional would have provided under similar circumstances. This is known as medical malpractice. To prove this, the party who was injured must establish four elements that include duty of care, breach of that duty, causation, and damages.
Many of the medical errors that cause birth injuries stem from simple errors, like the wrong diagnosis or inadequate treatment for prenatal complications. Others are complex such as shoulder dystocia. This is an issue which can result in complete or partial arm paralysis. In some instances birth injuries, they only become apparent later in childhood, as the child starts missing developmental milestones.
It is essential to contact a birth injury lawyer as soon as possible after the injury or the initial statute of limitations (SOL) will expire. There are exceptions to the SOL which may prolong the time frame for filing a lawsuit. A skilled birth injury attorney can provide specific SOLs applicable to your situation and suggest an appropriate time frame to file a lawsuit.
Expert testimony is often required to show that the doctor's treatment was not up to par with the standards of their area of expertise. Miller Weisbrod Olesky is a qualified medical malpractice firm that works with highly regarded experts across the nation to prove this in a birth injury case.
How to Claim a Claim?
A birth injury can cause a permanent and life-altering impact on the child, parents and the family. A successful claim can offer compensation for current and future medical expenses, loss of income, and suffering and pain. It may also help pay for the cost of specialized equipment and therapies. However the claim must be backed by expert medical testimony to establish that the nurse, doctor, or any other healthcare provider did not fulfill their duty of care and caused the child's injuries.
A New Mexico birth injury lawyer can assist families to receive the justice they deserve by filing a lawsuit against the accountable medical provider or healthcare facility. It is crucial to remember that medical malpractice claims have strict statutes. Lawyers can look over the details of the case to determine when the statute started to run, so that legal action may be taken before the statute expires.
In certain instances doctors may be held accountable for birth injuries even if medical negligence was not committed at the time of birth. This type of negligence could be the result of a delay in diagnosing or treating a maternal condition, improper use of forceps during delivery, or a failed Caesarean section.
Other causes of birth injury could be the lack of oxygen to the brain during labor or a prolonged labor. A New Mexico birth-injury lawyer can examine the facts of a case to determine the possible accountable parties, including nurses, doctors or hospitals. In most cases these lawsuits are filed against the facility where the healthcare professional who was negligent was employed.
It is not uncommon for defendant to argue that there could be other causes for the baby's injuries such as genetic defects or fetal developmental issues. A New Mexico birth injury attorney can help the victim and their family counter this argument by establishing that there was evidence of malpractice and that the medical professional's actions or inability to act in a direct manner caused the child's injuries.
Miller Weisbrod Olesky, a New Mexico birth injury attorney, can investigate the situation. They can also engage one or more medical experts to establish that the healthcare provider's actions or inactions fell below the standard of care for a similar situation. This is the reason for the child's injuries. A successful claim can recover compensatory damages, which include past and future medical expenses and income loss, pain and suffering, and other damages.