High Court awards largest medical negligence payout

NASSAU, Bahamas (CMC):

A High Court has awarded US$3.6 million to the family of a child after a botched delivery 12 years ago left their newborn boy with lifelong brain injuries and near-total physical disability.

“I, therefore, find on a balance of probabilities that the defendant caused the injuries to the plaintiff by his successive failed attempts to deliver the baby prior to the arrival of Dr Bloomfield and that the injuries were of a kind that fell within the scope of the defendant’s duty of care and were foreseeable,” Justice Loren Klein said in one of the country’s largest medical negligence award.

Dr Gregory Carey, who has delivered more than 1,000 babies during his 30-year practice, denied negligence and blamed genetics for the child’s condition.

The 12 year old boy is in a near-vegetative state, suffering from cerebral palsy, epilepsy, and other neurological impairments.

The High Court heard that Dr Carey never apologised for the outcome and, according to the child’s father, even joked it was his “most difficult delivery” and that “they were trying to mess up his record”.

The child’s injuries were traced to hypoxic-ischaemic encephalopathy (HIE), a brain injury caused by oxygen deprivation during delivery. The court found this was the result of prolonged and failed attempts at a vaginal delivery when a caesarean section should have been performed.

According to court documents, the child’s mother arrived at Princess Margaret Hospital around 4.15 am (local time) on August 5, 2012 and Dr Carey tried to deliver the baby using a vacuum extractor and later forceps, but both efforts failed.

After 30 minutes of unsuccessful attempts, another doctor, Dr Harold Bloomfield, the consultant gynaecologist and obstetrician, was called and delivered the baby at 11.45am using forceps. The child was born unconscious, not breathing, and with the umbilical cord around his neck. He was resuscitated and admitted to the Neonatal Intensive Care Unit.

In the weeks and years that followed, the child was diagnosed with a series of debilitating conditions, including West Syndrome, Lennox-Gastaut Syndrome, microcephaly, and permanent neurological impairment. Medical experts testified that he will require round-the-clock care for the rest of his life.

Dr Carey denied wrong-doing, claiming he was fully trained in the use of delivery instruments and that neither the vacuum nor the forceps were responsible for the injuries. He argued developmental abnormalities or other unknown factors may have caused the damage.

Dr Bloomfield testified that he didn’t see any signs that the baby was in distress. And that if he had he would have proceeded to a caesarean section.

But Dr John Busowski, a specialist in the field of obstetrics and gynaecology, testified that sequential use of vacuum and forceps had been tied to increased rates of brain injury.

“In this tragic case, the use of multiple instruments used for her delivery resulted in trauma to the baby. These injuries were the direct cause of the child’s current and life-long condition,” Dr Busowski said, adding he believed that if a caesarean section had been performed after the first failed attempt at assisted delivery, the outcome would have been prevented.