Articles Posted in Cerebral Palsy

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Rachel Harris was admitted to Truman Medical Center to deliver her child. She was given Pitocin over the course of approximately 6 hours. She was attended by a family practice physician, Dr. Kelly Sandri, and a resident-physician. Harris’s baby suffered hypoxic-ischemic brain damage resulting in cerebral palsy.

Harris, on her daughter’s behalf, sued the hospital and Dr. Sandri, alleging excessive administration of Pitocin, which led to the child’s brain damage and birth injury.

Harris also alleged that Dr. Sandri had not properly supervised the resident who also chose not to respond to signs of Pitocin overdose evident on the fetal monitor.
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Erin Gresser suffered from Type 1 diabetes. She was admitted to North Colorado Medical Center after receiving a diagnosis of preeclampsia. Gresser was treated for group B strep infection during her labor and prolonged late decelerations occurred.

Gresser’s daughter, Carina, had Apgar scores of 8 and 9 at 1 and 5 minutes and abnormal pH levels. Carina also had hyperbilirubinemia and became tachycardic later the same evening, prompting her admission to the hospital’s ICU for further evaluation and treatment.

Carina suffered episodes of bradycardia and continued tachycardia. The laboratory allegedly reported a positive blood culture with gram-negative rods. Additionally, the gram stain from cerebral spinal fluid was positive for gram-negative rods.
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Julien Florez was born on March 22, 2009. His mother, Aimee Florez, was admitted to Evanston Hospital just after noon that day, five days after her due date. All tests and ultrasounds registered normal. After a procedure to break her water, Julien experienced a prolonged deceleration in fetal heart rate after his mother was given an epidural. Pitocin was administered by a second doctor to accelerate labor, and when Julien’s heart rate decelerated, a C-section was ordered.

Julien was delivered by C-section with an Apgar score of 1 out of 10, blue, and with an abnormally low heart rate requiring intervention due to lack of blood to the brain. Body cooling was initiated to slow or prevent additional brain damage. Within five hours of birth, Julien showed signs of seizures.

Julien, represented by his parents, Aimee and David Florez, filed a lawsuit. Julien suffered from cerebral palsy. At age 9, he exhibited global delays, significant speech and language deficit, requiring assistance eating, dressing and with hygiene as well as 24-hour supervision.
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The Illinois Appellate Court has ruled a woman may be able to hold the hospital liable for injuries her child sustained during labor and delivery.

The Illinois Appellate Court for the 5th District reversed a trial judge’s decision that the patient should have known the doctor who delivered her twins was independent from the hospital.

The appeals panel wrote that there were still questions as to whether the physician and the hospital made it appear the doctor was an agent of the institution rather than a contractor.
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During delivery of newborn Sophie Vergara at Kaiser Permanente San Francisco Medical Center, there were signs of fetal distress. Nonetheless, the Kaiser treating medical providers continued with a vacuum-assisted delivery.

As a result of this difficult delivery, Sophie Vergara suffered a brachial plexus injury and brain damage that necessitated resuscitation and treatment with seizure medication.

Sophie is now 6 years old and has been diagnosed as having spastic quadriplegia cerebral palsy, which requires 24-hour-per-day medical attention.
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The use of fetoscopy was first developed in the 1990s. The process involves ultrasound-guided placement of a stethoscope – a small, fiber optic instrument – in the uterus to see the fetus and the placenta.

Fetoscopy as a surgical procedure can treat various fetal conditions including congenital diaphragmatic hernia and bladder outlet obstruction. Its most common use is the treatment of a rare condition, Twin-Twin Transfusion Syndrome (TTTS).

The condition of TTTS occurs when identical twins share a placenta with blood vessel connections that cause blood to flow unevenly between the two fetuses. According to the article, “Caught on Camera” by attorney Jeffrey B. Killino, one of the fetuses develops a small amniotic sac while the other sac becomes too large. Laser fetoscopy allows the laser to break up and collapse these blood vessel connections. Reportedly, if the condition is not treated, both of the fetuses can die. TTTS occurs in approximately 1 in 2,500 pregnancies. It is expected that there will be a rise in TTTS occurrences because of the increase in fertility-assisted pregnancies.
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Two weeks after Baby Doe’s premature birth, she developed signs of jaundice. Seven hours later, a check of her bilirubin revealed a severely elevated level of 29. The attending doctor ordered retesting of the bilirubin level but did not order any treatment.

Hours later, when a second bilirubin test showed a level of 27.1, the same doctor was notified by nurses of the out-of-balance level. By the next morning, the child’s bilirubin level increased to 32.1. Another physician began treating Baby Doe the next morning and ordered phototherapy, which began more than 17 hours after Baby Doe’s first bilirubin test was reported to the first doctor. Phototherapy is the usual treatment for jaundiced newborns.

Baby Doe suffered kernicterus resulting from severe jaundice. Kernicterus is a kind of brain damage caused by excessive jaundice, just as Baby Doe had endured. Baby Doe is now 10 years old. She suffers from cerebral palsy and cannot speak or walk. The Doe family sued the health system that employed the doctors involved alleging that they chose not to timely test Baby Doe’s bilirubin level at the first signs of jaundice and chose not to timely treat the jaundice. That failure caused the child’s permanent and severe injuries.
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Illinois is not one of the many states that have enacted non-economic damage caps on medical malpractice lawsuits. However, Illinois lawmakers have three times voted to enact such laws; each was found unconstitutional for a variety of reasons.

According to a paper completed by Rutgers Law School Professor Sabrina Safrin, caps on non-economic damages in medical malpractice cases have no effect on a procedure that’s among the most commonly undertaken in operating rooms across the United States: cesarean sections. “C-sections are arguably the poster child for so-called-defensive medicine,” the professor wrote in her paper.

C-sections involve cutting through a mother’s abdomen and uterine wall to remove the fetus. In many cesarean delivery cases, the fetus may have been observed to be in distress. By delivering an emergency C-section child, the purpose is preventing brain damage, cerebral palsy and other life-altering birth injuries.
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During the delivery of the newborn in this case, the fetal monitor of the fetus indicated non-reassuring signs over the course of several hours, including heart rate abnormalities. In this summary of the case, the baby is Baby Doe. This was a confidential settlement in which the parties were identified as Doe, being the mother of the newborn, Baby Doe and Roe, being the physician, the obstetrician and hospital that were sued.

The mother of Baby Doe experienced uterine tachysystole. Uterine tachysystole is defined as six contractions in a ten-minute period.There have been many studies as to whether more than six contractions over a ten-minute period within the first four hours of labor induction is associated with adverse infant outcomes. However, six more contractions in ten minutes were significantly associated with fetal heart rate decelerations.

A nurse at the Roe hospital notified the treating obstetrician who allegedly reviewed the monitor strips but did not re-examine Baby Doe’s mother.Baby Doe was born in a depressed condition with Apgar scores of 3 at one minute and 6 at five minutes.
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Rebecca Kerrins, the mother of now 5-year-old Drew Kerrins, sued Palos Community Hospital, Dr. Thomas Myers and Renaissance Medical Group alleging that Dr. Myers chose not to make himself available to take care of Drew’s emergency soon after the baby was delivered.

After a bench trial, a Cook County judge entered a judgment for more than $23 million to the family of Drew Kerrins because of the delay in providing a blood transfusion, which led to the child’s development of cerebral palsy and other cognitive injuries.

Rebecca Kerrins was admitted to Palos Community Hospital to deliver her baby in June 2011. Unfortunately, her placenta separated from her uterine wall at the time of delivery, which caused the baby to lose as much as half of her blood by the time she was delivered.
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