subject: Child Suffers Permanent Disability Because Nurse Overlooked Indications Of Placental Abruption [print this page] It is normal for expectant mothers to place themselves and their unborn baby in the hands of a doctor who will get them through childbirth. It may oftentimes take quite a bit of time following the patient's admission to the hospital until the newborn is delivered. In some of this time physicians often rely on the nurses and staff to observe the woman's situation and to keep them advised of any complications that may arise.
The physician is still responsible for supervising the nurses and staff. Further, the nurses and staff are responsible for having the knowledge, training and experience to recognize symptoms of difficulties and for informing the physician if they do come up. The fact is, though, that nurses and staff on occasion fail to satisfy these requirements.
Look at the documented lawsuit alleging that an expectant mother at full term started experiencing contractions while at home. On the way the local hospital the woman also started having nonstop severe pain. When she got to at the hospital the woman complained to the admitting nurse that she was experiencing severe pain alerting the nurse that she believed something was wrong. However the nurse either failed to register or dismissed her complaints and failed to contact the doctor, who had not arrived at the hospital, to inform him.
Rather the nurse acted as though this was a typical pregnancy. Precious time passed before she even commenced monitoring the fetal heart rate. When she at last did figure out that the unborn baby was experiencing fetal distress. Now she did notify the obstetrician, who still was not in the hospital, by telephone. A second obstetrician on the unit took charge and did an emergency C-section. The extreme pain had been due to a placental abruption. The abruption cased the unborn baby to suffer from a restricted supply of oxygen leading to serious brain injury. The infant is permanently disabled and has to have full time care. The law firm that handled this claim published that the case settled for from the hospital for the nursing staff's failure to recognize that the mother had suffered a placental abruption.
In this case the patient basically alerted the nurse of her sense that a complication had developed in the pregnancy. At this stage in the pregnancy extreme continual abdominal pain can be the result of a placental abruption. It is not clear why the nurse failed to put these together. If she dismissed the woman's complaints, did not hear them, did not have the necessary knowledge, training or experience to correctly understand the situation, or discounted the woman's complaints since an abruption is commonly (though not always) accompanied by observable vaginal bleeding, she overlooked signs of a serious problem.
The result, unfortunately, was a severe injury to the unborn child producing a lifelong disability. Because of the harm caused by the nurse's error the law firm that represented the family documented that it managed to obtain a settlement designed to be enough so that the child has proper care for life.
by: Joseph Hernandez
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