If your child suffered a birth injury, medical records will play a critical role in your case
If your child suffered a preventable birth injury such as brain damage or cerebral palsy, getting to the bottom of what happened will require a thorough review of the medical records. Obtaining medical records as quickly as possible is thus a key part of litigating a birth injury case.
Because the medical care leading up to and following a birth injury is often complex and provided by multiple different providers, getting all of your medical records can be a complicated process. Here’s what you need to know.
What medical records are important in a birth injury case?
- Prenatal care records: There are a lot of medical records generated throughout a pregnancy, including every OB/GYN visit as well as visits to primary care providers and often other specialists as well. Those records might indicate that there was some degree of negligence during the prenatal care itself. They can also help prove what information was available to your doctors during labor and delivery, which in turn can help establish negligence if they failed to act on warning signs or take appropriate precautions.
- Surgical records: After any surgical procedure, including a cesarean section, the surgeon must complete a surgical note and/or an operative note (“op note”). These notes document what procedure was performed, the start and end time of the procedure, the medical professionals who were involved in the procedure (doctors, residents, nurses, technicians, etc.), what anesthesia was used, and anything that went wrong during the procedure, such as excessive bleeding or other complications. Surgical records can help your attorney piece together what happened during the surgery and who may have been responsible for any injuries.
- NICU records: If your child was treated in the NICU for some time after birth, NICU records might indicate what symptoms he or she experienced, which may have been early signs of a birth injury. They may also indicate negligence during neonatal care.
- Hospital records: This includes both the hospitalization for the birth itself and any prior or subsequent hospitalizations for pregnancy complications or post-birth medical issues. Hospital records tend to be quite lengthy and comprehensive, so you need an experienced attorney to sift through them to find the information needed to support your claim.
- Lab and imaging results: Blood tests, ultrasounds, and other diagnostic tests performed during pregnancy, as well as tests performed shortly after birth, are critical for two reasons. First, they can help establish the mother’s or child’s medical condition and explain why and how the injury happened. Second, diagnostic tests establish when your doctors knew or should have known about certain warning signs, which can, in turn, help to establish negligence.
The process to obtain your medical records in Ohio
The first step to get your medical records is to identify all providers who have records you need. Again, this can get complicated because there are often several different doctors and entities involved. In general, you may need to request records from:
- The hospital or birthing center where the birth occurred,
- The hospital that provided NICU care for your child,
- The OB/GYN practice that provided your prenatal care,
- The OB/GYN practice of the doctor who actually delivered your child,
- The anesthesia practice of the anesthesiologist involved in your delivery, if applicable,
- Your child’s pediatrician or family doctor, and
- Any other medical providers who provided care related to the birth injury.
Then, you need to write a detailed request explaining exactly what records you need. Under HIPAA, you have the right to your own records, and your providers have to give them to you within 30 days. That said, providers are not always cooperative in practice, so it’s important to follow up and make sure you get all the records you need.
The role of your birth injury lawyer
Again, getting your medical records can be a complex and time-consuming process. That’s why it’s so important to have an attorney who has extensive experience handling birth injury and medical malpractice cases. We can work with you to identify all the medical providers involved and either guide you through the process of requesting your records or handle the requests on your behalf.
Just as importantly, we know what to do with your records once we have them. We know how to efficiently review records to find key signs of negligence, hire the right experts to explain what they mean, and build a winning case on behalf of your child. Our approach gets results, including a $12.6 million recovery for a baby diagnosed with cerebral palsy.
Getting and reviewing your medical records takes time. That’s one reason it’s so important to get legal advice right away. Give us a call or contact us online to speak with an experienced birth injury lawyer at the Lancione Law Firm.