Protecting your child's future
Birth Injury Attorneys St. Joseph, MO
Birth Injury Attorneys in St. Joseph, MO. After the devastation of a birth injury, you need an experienced lawyer you can trust and lean on to fight for your family in this terrible moment. Contact the birth injury attorneys of Burger Law in St. Joseph, MO right away at (314) 500-HURT to talk about your birth injury case for free and learn what we will do to help you recover maximum compensation for your damages. Let our legal experts help your family move forward and be made whole with a complete financial recovery.
When your child suffers a birth injury at any time during or shortly after your pregnancy, it can be distressing and painful. It can be even more enraging when the birth injury occurred due to negligent or improper medical care. If your child has been hurt because a doctor did not give you the care you and your child deserved, Burger Law’s St. Joseph, MO team of birth injury lawyers will fight on your behalf to win the financial compensation you and your family deserve to secure you and your loved ones’ future and start on the journey to recovery. Call our St. Joseph, MO birth injury attorneys now at (314) 500-HURT or contact us online to get your free case review to see why hiring Burger Law is the first step to making you and your family whole again.
Birth Injuries in St. Joseph, MO
About six to eight out of 1,000 children born in the United States experience a severe birth injury, which is about one in every 9,714 children and 28,000 births a year. About two percent of neonatal deaths are because of birth injuries. Examples of such birth injuries are fractures or disorders that affect an infant’s development or brain function.
Many St. Joseph, MO attorneys may have seen some medical malpractice suits, but not in birth injury cases or with the certain birth injury you or your child experienced. Our Burger Law birth injury lawyers have seen every variety of birth injury and know every type of birth injury suit, and you can be confident that we will fight on your behalf until you get a full recovery.
Do I Need a St. Joseph, MO Birth Injury Lawyer?
If you feel that you or your child was hurt due to a doctor’s negligence or breach of care, then it is necessary to turn to the aid of experienced birth injury attorneys in St. Joseph, MO. Rearing a child in St. Joseph, MO already comes with a ton of expenses and concerns including food, clothing, school supplies and more. Add to that the possibility that you will have to pay their medical bills for years or their entire life all due to a doctor’s negligence or careless actions. You should be thinking about when your child will outgrow their pajamas, not when they will outgrow their wheelchair because a doctor disregarded the rules.
The accomplished St. Joseph, MO birth injury attorneys at Burger Law will work out your complete damages, including the dollar sum of any possible future medical costs and other expenses and damages. Your dedicated birth injury attorney will fight until you collect a full and just recovery.
Whatever your child’s condition, you want to spend your energy supplying your child with nourishment and delight, not scrambling to maneuver through a maze of convoluted legal procedures. When you contact our birth injury attorneys at (314) 500-HURT, we get started on your case right away to get you the best possible results. We manage all the documentation, communication and litigation so you can concentrate on you and your child’s physical and emotional well-being. Our adept birth injury lawyers will maximize your compensation and get you and your family on the journey to recovery. We finance your case so you will not have to pay any fees until we win your case.
Thankfully, many birth injuries are minor, and as babies are still developing and growing quickly, some injuries can heal fairly quickly. But whether the injury is minor or leads to lifelong disability, you are entitled to maximum compensation for your medical expenses, pain and suffering and other damages if the injury was incurred because a doctor or medical institution in St. Joseph, MO disregarded the rules and did not give you and your newborn child the professional care they should have.
Kinds of Birth Injuries
Cerebral Palsy
Cerebral palsy is a group of disorders that limits movement and the most common form of birth injury that affects about 4 in 1,000 children. There are three kinds of cerebral palsy:
- Spasticity (stiff muscles)
- Dyskinesia (uncontrollable movements)
- Ataxia (poor balance and coordination)
Spasticity is the most common type and affects about 80% of people with cerebral palsy. The disorder can be mild – the child may have an awkward gait but does not necessitate any particular assistance – or more severe, and your child may require special equipment to walk or not be able to walk at all. Diagnosing and treating cerebral palsy involves closely following your child’s development, and that can include comprehensive medical appointments, pricey evaluations and special equipment to help your child walk or carry out other daily functions. The St. Joseph, MO-based birth injury lawyers at Burger Law demand that the responsible party pays for all of your past, present and future medical damages associated with your birth injury.
The medical world is still discovering more about the causes and potential risk factors of cerebral palsy. We do know it is caused by abnormal development of the brain while the brain is still developing, which can take place before, during or shortly after birth. When it takes place during birth, it is often because a doctor or nurse who was delivering the baby was negligent. Doctors need to properly monitor if a child is in distress or if it is receiving enough oxygen to its blood supply.
If they fail to do so and your baby develops cerebral palsy as a result, Burger Law’s St. Joseph, MO birth injury attorneys will take on your lawsuit and make certain that you get the best possible recovery you are owed. If you are nervous that your child is not meeting motor skill milestones and suspect they might have cerebral palsy, it is essential to immediately reach out to your doctor, who will evaluate your child and might refer you to a specialist. You can also contact Missouri’s Early Intervention system for a free examination if your child is still under three years of age. If your child is diagnosed with cerebral palsy and you think a medical professional in St. Joseph, MO is at fault, call Burger Law now at (314) 500-HURT for your complimentary consultation with a qualified St. Joseph, MO birth injury attorney, and start on the path to collecting maximum compensation and protecting the future of you and your child.
Brachial Plexus Injuries and Erb’s Palsy
Brachial plexus injuries are a category of birth injury that results from damage to the brachial plexus – the network of nerves in the shoulder that directs movement and feeling in the upper extremities – during birth. It restricts the use of the arm and shoulder. This is caused by excessive stretching around the shoulder, neck or head during birth, typically when the infant’s head is stretched to the side. This can occur because the baby was oversized, atypical birthing presentations such as buttocks first or because a doctor pulled to hard and too long on the infant during delivery. Erb’s Palsy is a variety of brachial plexus injury where the arm is weak and the shoulder joint lacks range of motion. Some severe cases involve the tearing of the nerves and can result in lifelong nerve damage. Fortunately, in most cases, range of motion will return within a few months, and there are particular exercises you can practice with your child to help retain range of motion while he or she heals. No matter the scope of the injury or and the cost of the medical treatment, the St. Joseph, MO birth injury lawyers at Burger Law will ensure that you collect maximum compensation and that the negligible party’s insurance company pays every dollar they owe.
Shoulder Dystocia
When the fetus's shoulder or shoulders cannot easily pass through the mother during labor, it causes a birth injury complication known as shoulder dystocia. Most of the time, the infant is born without serious incident, and treatment may entail just moving the mother’s and fetus’s position during delivery. However, neglecting to notice or sufficiently treat shoulder dystocia can lead to fracture, lack of oxygen, Erb's palsy, or extreme loss of blood for the mother. If any of these conditions occurred during your child’s birth, reach out to our St. Joseph, MO birth injury attorneys at (314) 500-HURT right away.
Cephalohematoma
This birth injury occurs when blood pools between a baby’s scalp and the skull because of damaged blood vessels during labor or delivery. You will see a bump on your infant’s head, which usually goes away in a few weeks. The condition is usually mild, however, there are a few uncommon issues that can emerge. Cephalohematoma can increase your baby’s risk of jaundice or anemia, and your baby may necessitate a blood transfusion or other treatments.
Bruising, Lacerations, Soft Tissue Injuries or Fractures
Bruises and cuts are typically minor birth injuries that heal quickly. Nevertheless, they lead to extra medical costs and undeserved anxiety for the parents. It is not uncommon that a baby can be bruised or cut by complications in the birth process. For example, if the baby is oversized or the birth is excessively long, the baby spends too much time pushed up against the mother’s pelvis and can be injured.
Clearly, fractures are much more grave and can do much more harm. While broken bones during birth can cause long-term or lifelong disability, usually they heal comparatively quickly as infants are rapidly and perpetually growing new bone. Regardless, a fracture during delivery causes unimaginable pain for your child and mental anguish for you. The delivering doctor must notice the conditions of birth and take precautions to protect the mother and child from harm. When the doctor does not treat you as the are required to, you may have a birth injury claim. Our birth injury attorneys will fight to get you the recovery you and your, family deserve while holding the negligent doctor responsible.
Occasionally there are steps a St. Joseph, MO doctor should have utilized but neglected to, and other times the doctor improperly used delivery tools or used too much force during birth. In that instance, it is imperative to reach out to our birth injury attorneys in St. Joseph, MO straight away to discuss your options. Contact us today for a free case evaluation.
Injury to the Mother
Occasionally, the mother or both the mother and child received injuries during labor. The mother may experience excessive blood loss or other complications. In some cases, the mother is injured because of a doctor’s substandard care. For example, high blood pressure before or during delivery can indicate preeclampsia, which can lead to seizures. If you had a seizure while giving birth after a doctor neglected to notice your high blood pressure, you are entitled to damages and our birth injury attorneys will demand that you are fairly compensated.
Emotional Injury
Not all damages in birth injury cases are quantifiable. If you or your child were hurt because of a careless physician, then you have experienced unmerited worry, anxiety, heartbreak, shock and more. In the most devastating cases, you and your child may have to accept the possibility of your child never being able to take part in typical St. Joseph, MO childhood activities or having special medical necessities for the remainder of their life. Getting a full recovery for your pain and suffering and mental anguish is an important step in making you whole again. In order to receive the full recovery you and your family are entitled to, you require skilled birth injury attorneys in St. Joseph, MO on your case. Burger Law’s team of birth injury lawyers can help.
It is important to realize that there are several potential causes of birth injuries that do not have to do with medical negligence or a breach of care. For example, many St. Joseph, MO birth injuries occur in the event of a delayed birth (labor that lasts over 18 hours). In some instances of delayed birth, a Cesarean section may have been the best method of treatment and in others, it might not have been. That depends on your unique labor. Each patient and each birth is different and individual cases vary greatly.
Our St. Joseph, MO birth injury attorney at Burger Law has experience with every kind of birth injury claim and will help you decide if the standard of care you were given is below that which a capable doctor would have given you. Our network of St. Joseph, MO physicians and medical experts will help us understand the specific elements of your birth injury, determine the value of your injuries and conclusively demonstrate the doctor’s negligence in providing you and your child substandard care so that we can get you maximum compensation to make you and your child whole.
Medical Malpractice Lawsuits
Physicians, healthcare professionals and St. Joseph, MO medical institutions have what is called medical professional liability insurance, otherwise known as medical malpractice insurance. Like any St. Joseph, MO insurance company, these insurers will try to bully, trick, and swindle you with convoluted and misleading legal gibberish. The talented birth injury lawyers at Burger law will handle all communication and litigation for you and will fight back against bullies like resistant insurance companies to ensure they fulfill their obligation and give you the full compensation you are entitled to. Medical malpractice cases in St. Joseph, MO can be tricky, but our birth injury attorneys have over twenty years of experience fighting and winning birth injury suits and will acquire the evidence, proof, expert testimony and, eventually, the complete compensation you are entitled to.
In order to succeed in a medical malpractice suit, you must achieve three things:
- Determine and prove negligence. Not all instances of birth complications or birth injury are the result of a doctor’s negligence. You must prove that the physician gave you a substandard level of care that a capable doctor in the same field would have provided you. Burger Law’s network of St. Joseph, MO physicians and medical experts will help determine if there was negligence, and prove it in your case.
- Get a letter of support. You will need to hire a St. Joseph, MO doctor or nurse in the same field—in this instance, neonatal care—to write a letter saying that the care you received was negligent, improper, or substandard. As your birth injury attorneys, the Burger Law team will obtain your letter of support.
- Prove that negligence caused the injury. Your child might develop cerebral palsy or may be born with a broken collarbone because of shoulder dystocia. The doctor may or may not be responsible, and you will have to prove that the doctor’s behavior or inaction directly led to the harm. You need a Burger Law St. Joseph, MO birth injury lawyer you trust to help demonstrate how the defendant's negligence caused a birth injury that has harmed you and your child.
Burger law’s dedicated team of St. Joseph, MO-based birth injury attorneys will fight by your side every step of the way and handle all the legal work for you so you can spend your energy on the health of you and your child.
The St. Joseph, MO lawyers of Burger Law have the experience and knowledge to help you receive the full recovery you deserve after any accident or injury caused by someone else leaves you injured. Learn more about our fields of expertise below.
Call Our St. Louis Birth Injury Attorneys Today
If your baby experienced a birth injury, it is normal to feel a whole spectrum of emotions: frightened, confused, mad and heartbroken. If the birth injury occurs because of medical malpractice, Burger Law will stand by your side to fight for your maximum compensation and put you on the road to recovery. Our unflinching St. Joseph, MO birth injury lawyers will take up your case and work around the clock for you, from initial consultation until we win your case. Let us help you safeguard you and your child’s future. Get a free case review today by calling us at (314) 500-HURT or by filling out this form.