Brainpalsy.com - Helping Parents Combat Cerebral Palsy

The most simple answer as to why a child is suffering from cerebral palsy is because they have suffered some form of damage to their brain. Normally such damage will have occurred before, during or after the child has been born. But in order to find out which kind of injury to the brain and the causes of cerebral palsy a doctor will need to carry out various medical and neurological tests on the child.

Unfortunately when medical professionals are investigating why the child has suffered a brain injury find it difficult to know what for sure had caused it. Because they are unable to discover what has caused the initial injury to the childs brain they also find it difficult to have ways of preventing it in the first place. But in many cases where a child is suffering from cerebral palsy there are two injuries to their brain which can be the cause of them suffering from this particular condition.

The first is because the childs brain has been unable to develop properly and is commonly referred to as developmental brain malformation. Unfortunately with this kind of injury to the brain there is very little chance available medically to help prevent such an injury occurring.

The other cause for a child to suffer brain damage whilst still in their mothers womb or as they are being born or after they have been born is through a recognized injury. The kinds of injuries that fall in to this category are infections (such as meningitis), blood has been allowed to bleed into the brain or the child has not been provided with sufficient amounts of oxygen to their brain. Around 10 to 15% of all children who suffer from cerebral palsy will have been caused by such injuries.

Also a large proportion of the cases of cerebral palsy to be found in young children today have been caused through medical mistakes and could therefore have been easily prevented. Often a large number of children who have cerebral palsy will have suffered from some kind of brain damage when they were being delivered and therefore could easily have been prevented.

But just how bad a childs cerebral palsy is will depend on how severe the damage to their brain was. For a baby who is born prematurely and suffers from an intraventricular haemorrhage (bleeding into the brain) will suffer from very extensive brain damage.

Above we have explained some of the causes of cerebral palsy in children today and on average around 6,000 new cases are presenting themselves in the USA each year. Currently the medical bill to cover the costs of caring for such children in the USA alone is running at around $20 billion a year. But the biggest question being asked by many parents today whose child suffers from cerebral palsy was if it could have been prevented or not?

Though cerebral palsy has been known to have its cause in the fetal developmental stage itself, yet, medical negligence cannot be entirely ruled out. This is the reason why cerebral palsy litigation has become a specialized branch of its own. Legal firms dealing in cerebral palsy litigation employ medical professionals to do medical sleuthing for them. This is because the medical field is very specialized and it is not possible for a legal person to know all the ins and outs of treatment and birth procedures. With time, their expertise does improve; still the help afforded by a trained medical eye is very essential.

An unbelievable $120 million verdict was awarded for a delayed breech delivery. The ruling said that an earlier delivery would have prevented the permanent brain damage that the child suffered. Damages of $103 million were awarded in favor of another child victimized due to a delayed delivery. The delay caused a lack of oxygen supply to the child’s brain that resulted in cerebral palsy.

If the attending doctors fail to recognize a symptom in the mother that could be a potential cause for cutting off oxygen supply to the fetus, he or she can be held responsible for the child’s condition. In one such case, the attending doctor failed to recognize abdominal pain as a symptom of the placenta separating from the uterus. This condition is known as a placental abruption and a delay in attending to the mother resulted in the child’s brain getting insufficient oxygen. As a result the child had permanent brain damage.

At times there is a failure to detect and treat a newborn’s jaundiced condition in time. This causes bilirubin levels to reach dangerously high levels and lead to permanent brain damage. There have been cases where compensation has been awarded on these grounds.

While most medical institutions and medical personnel take utmost care while performing their duties, mistakes can and do happen. And as per the law of the land if the mistake is proven, the guilty has to pay for his or her mistake.

Among the legal cases tackling medical malpractice, cerebral palsy lawsuits are the most common. In a 1993 in a study of medical malpractices, cerebral palsy lawsuits accounted for 60 percent of the total number of medical malpractice lawsuits in the United States.

The United States is one of the countries that have the most number of cerebral palsy lawsuits. Based on 2002 statistical reports, more than 1,000 medical malpractice payments were made due to obstetrics related malpractice. A mean payment of almost $500,000 was made for such cases. In terms of actual payment, it has also been found that there is a median of 5.56 year delay in the issuance of the costs of actual damages.

There may be several allegations associated with cerebral palsy lawsuits. An example is malpractice in the management of pregnancy that led to further damage to the child who was detected to have cerebral palsy. Such damages may include excessive blood loss or asphyxia or birth trauma. Another common allegation is delay or failure to perform Caesarian operation because of wrong medical findings related to cerebral palsy.

Successful cerebral palsy lawsuits usually involve a great deal of payments made by the accused to the petitioner. In the District of Columbia, the largest medical malpractice related to cerebral palsy cost $24 million. This involves a child who suffered brain damage and cerebral palsy due to the doctor’s failure to respond to an airway obstruction. Another costly case involved $10.8 million paid to the family of a child who suffered from cerebral palsy and mental retardation because of the doctor’s failure to respond to symptoms of a uterine rupture.

Other successful cases have involved millions of dollars. Other causes are mismanaged labor and delivery and failure to respond to signs of placental abruption. Meanwhile, there are also lawsuits filed against medical malpractice lawyers. In one case, a group of lawyers had to pay $2.6 million for failing to get appropriate medical experts to strengthen the case of mismanaged labor resulting to cerebral palsy.

There are a number of lawyers who specialize in medical malpractices. They can be contacted to assist in filing cerebral palsy lawsuits. Usually, they offer free initial consultation. Others even offer free online consultation.