Medical negligence during childbirth

[jennylamb1]

When I had my son (14 years ago now) I had a difficult birth and concerns over it. I don't know if it's too late to pursue legally, but it has always bothered me.
I had been having regular thought weakish contractions and because it was 24 hours over my waters having broken and after a sweep, I was induced.
was induced myself and my partner remember hearing one of the midwives saying to the other 'you haven't started it on that have you,' and shortly after I was in a lot of pain with one huge contraction which didn't seem to end. My baby's heart beat went right down and they were pressing the red button to rush me in for a c section.
After some panic the situation seemed to settle and they brought in a much more senior midwife who sat with me to check everything was going as it should. I had an epidural and the induction started at a much lower level.
I asked for my medical notes afterwards because I felt something had gone wrong and on the notes it says that the medical equipment was malfunctioning.
I don't know if it's too late to pursue anything, the birth was very stressful, because to be honest I wasn't sure that he would be born alive and I had post natal depression and some birth injuries during the final pushing stage because they were flapping too.
I don't feel as if I've put it to bed because it shouldn't have happened, but don't know if it's too late to pursue negligence because of what it heard/what the notes said/and because of the pain I went through.

I think you need to establish what “the medical equipment was malfunctioning” in your notes actually means

Your are entitled to try to claim until your baby is 18 years old.

Pursuing a claim would be hugely stressful and expensive. What do you think would come of it?

I’m assuming your son is ok as you haven’t said otherwise. After all this time, there wouldn’t be any lessons to be learned. And a lawyer once told me never to expect an apology even if someone does admit liability.

You might be better spending your money on therapy for birth trauma and putting this behind you.

This only applies if it is the child who suffered harm from the birth and is claiming for that harm, I believe. If it’s the mother who suffered harm and would be the claimant, the deadline is 3 years from the birth.

Yes, I meant to say that. Thanks for clarifying.

You are very unlikely to win negligence if there were no serious physical repercussions for you or the child that you can prove wouldn't have happened otherwise that has had a financial impact on you - eg needing care, needing to give up work, needing adjustments to the home etc. From the sound of it you don't even know if there was negligence. May have been the monitor was faulty and that's it and they fixed it so no negligence there.

It would also be very hard to prove 14 years later. it will depend on the hospital whether they will do it so late but they usually have birth trauma referrals (can't remember the name) where they will look over the notes and explain to you what happened to help you process it better.

Hi OP, we just wanted to flag that if you still have questions we're currently running a free medical negligence advice clinic that might be of use.

Thanks,
MNHQ