A Sterling Heights birth injury lawyer helps families determine whether a baby’s injury was caused by medical negligence during pregnancy, labor, or delivery.
At Goodman Acker, we review labor and delivery records, fetal monitoring strips, NICU documentation, and related medical evidence with qualified obstetric and neonatal professionals to identify preventable errors.
Birth injury claims are a type of medical malpractice case in Michigan, which means they involve strict notice, filing, and expert-review requirements.
If your child suffered cerebral palsy, Erb’s palsy, hypoxic brain injury, shoulder dystocia injuries, or another birth trauma, our attorneys can help you understand whether the medical records support a claim.
Call 248-483-5000 for a confidential, no-cost medical records review.
Why Birth Injury Cases Require a Law Firm That Understands Obstetric Medicine
Birth trauma claims are among the most medically intensive cases in all of personal injury law. The medical records alone may run hundreds of pages, including fetal heart rate tracings, nursing flowsheets, medication administration logs, and NICU admission notes.
Reading those records and identifying where the standard of care broke down requires attorneys who work alongside physicians in obstetrics and neonatology on a regular basis.
How Goodman Acker Evaluates These Claims Differently
Most families come to us months or years after the delivery, often after being told by the hospital that the outcome was unforeseeable. We do not take that at face value.
We obtain the complete labor and delivery file, have it reviewed by board-certified physicians outside the treating hospital’s system, and look for the specific decisions that deviated from accepted medical practice.
That independent review has uncovered preventable errors in cases where families were initially told nothing went wrong.
Our attorneys have recovered a $6.5 million medical malpractice settlement in Oakland County and a $1 million recovery for a patient who suffered brain damage due to hospital negligence.
Although past results do not guarantee future outcomes, birth injury litigation is a core part of our practice, not an occasional case type we accept when it comes through the door.
The Financial Model for Birth Injury Families
Families facing a potential birth injury claim are already dealing with mounting medical costs for a child who may need specialized care for years. Adding legal fees on top of that is not realistic for most households.
We take birth injury cases on a contingency fee basis, and we cover the cost of medical record retrieval and physician review during the case evaluation.
Your family pays no attorney fees unless we recover compensation for your child. Call 248-483-5000 to start that process.
How Do Parents Know If a Birth Injury Was Caused by Medical Negligence?
A birth injury may result from medical negligence when a healthcare provider fails to meet the accepted standard of care during pregnancy, labor, or delivery, and that failure directly causes harm to the baby or mother.
Not every birth complication is malpractice, but certain patterns strongly suggest a preventable error occurred.
Warning signs that a birth injury may have resulted from negligence include:
- Fetal heart rate abnormalities that appeared on the monitor but did not prompt timely intervention
- A delayed decision to perform a cesarean section when vaginal delivery was no longer safe
- Excessive traction or force applied during a difficult delivery, particularly during shoulder dystocia
- Failure to diagnose or respond to maternal infections, preeclampsia, or placental abnormalities
- NICU admission immediately after birth with no prior indication that complications were expected
None of these signs prove malpractice on their own. But when the medical records show a pattern of missed signals and delayed responses, that pattern often points to a deviation from the standard of care.
A birth injury attorney in Sterling Heights, MI reviews those records with the right medical professionals to connect the dots.
What Types of Birth Injuries Result from Delivery Errors?
Birth injuries caused by provider negligence range from nerve damage that may resolve with therapy to permanent brain injuries that affect a child for life.
The type of injury depends on what went wrong during delivery and how long the child went without adequate oxygen or blood flow. Michigan birth injury claims commonly involve the following conditions:
| Injury | How It Happens | Potential Long-Term Impact |
| Cerebral Palsy | Oxygen deprivation during prolonged or mismanaged labor | Motor impairment, speech difficulties, lifelong assistive care |
| Erb’s Palsy | Excessive lateral traction on the neck during shoulder dystocia | Weakness or paralysis in one arm, possible surgical repair |
| Hypoxic-Ischemic Encephalopathy (HIE) | Restricted blood flow or oxygen before or during delivery | Cognitive delays, seizures, developmental disabilities |
| Periventricular Leukomalacia (PVL) | Damage to white brain matter, often linked to premature birth complications | Motor and cognitive impairment, vision problems |
| Shoulder Dystocia Injuries | Baby’s shoulder lodges behind the mother’s pelvic bone during delivery | Nerve damage, fractured clavicle, brachial plexus injury |
The severity of these injuries varies widely. Some children with Erb’s palsy regain full arm function through physical therapy.
Others with HIE or cerebral palsy face decades of medical treatment, adaptive equipment, and specialized education. The financial scope of a birth injury claim must account for that full timeline.
What Procedural Steps Does Michigan Require Before Filing a Birth Injury Lawsuit?
Michigan classifies birth injury claims as medical malpractice, which means they follow a separate set of filing rules that do not apply to standard personal injury cases. Missing any of these procedural requirements may result in dismissal before a judge reviews the merits of your child’s case.
The 182-Day Notice of Intent
Under MCL 600.2912b, you must send a written notice of intent (NOI) to each healthcare provider you plan to sue at least 182 days before filing the lawsuit.
The NOI must describe the standard of care that was violated, the specific actions that breached that standard, and the injuries your child suffered as a result.
The Affidavit of Merit Requirement
Michigan law under MCL 600.2912d also requires an affidavit of merit signed by a qualified medical professional. That professional must meet specific qualification requirements related to the defendant provider’s area of practice.
The affidavit accompanies the complaint when the lawsuit is filed and confirms that the claim has a legitimate medical basis.
Filing Deadlines for Children Injured at Birth
For a medical malpractice claim that accrues before a child’s eighth birthday, Michigan law under MCL 600.5851 generally allows the claim to be filed by the child’s 10th birthday or within the standard medical malpractice limitations period under MCL 600.5838a, whichever is later.
Because exceptions and notice requirements may affect the timeline, parents who suspect a birth injury should speak with an attorney promptly to protect the child’s filing rights.
What Makes Birth Injury Compensation Different from Other Malpractice Claims?
Birth injury claims often carry the highest damage values in medical malpractice because the injuries affect a child for their entire life.
Compensation must account for decades of medical care, therapy, adaptive equipment, and lost earning capacity that a child with a permanent disability may face.
The categories of compensation in a Michigan birth injury case include:
- Past and future medical expenses, including surgeries, rehabilitation, medications, and specialized pediatric care
- Costs of adaptive equipment such as wheelchairs, communication devices, and home modifications
- Lost future earning capacity if the injury prevents the child from working as an adult
- Pain and suffering, subject to Michigan’s medical malpractice non-economic damages cap under MCL 600.1483
- Special education costs and in-home care or attendant services
Michigan’s non-economic damages cap in med mal cases applies to birth injury claims. A higher cap may apply in specific severe-injury situations, such as permanent cognitive impairment that prevents independent life decisions or certain forms of paralysis.
Your attorney must calculate the applicable cap based on your child’s specific injuries and the year the claim accrues.
The economic damages, including lifetime medical costs and lost earning capacity, have no cap. In severe birth injury cases, those economic figures often represent the largest portion of the total claim value.
How Does Fetal Monitoring Factor into a Sterling Heights Birth Injury Case?
Electronic fetal monitoring (EFM) records provide some of the most powerful evidence in birth injury litigation.
The fetal heart rate tracing creates a minute-by-minute record of how the baby responded to labor, and it reveals whether the medical team noticed and reacted to signs of distress.
Fetal monitoring failures that commonly appear in birth injury cases include:
- Failing to recognize non-reassuring heart rate patterns such as late decelerations or prolonged bradycardia
- Continuing Pitocin (a labor-stimulating drug) despite signs of fetal distress on the monitor
- Inadequate monitoring during high-risk labor situations such as vaginal birth after cesarean (VBAC)
- Delays between recognizing distress on the monitor and deciding to perform an emergency cesarean section
- Misinterpreting the tracing and reassuring the family that the baby was fine when the data showed otherwise
The fetal monitoring strip does not lie. When the tracing shows distress and the medical team failed to act on it in time, that record becomes the foundation of the liability case.
Our attorneys work with obstetric professionals who read and interpret these tracings as part of their daily practice.
FAQs for Sterling Heights Birth Injury Lawyers
How long does a birth injury lawsuit take in Michigan?
Birth injury lawsuits in Michigan typically take longer than other injury cases because of the mandatory 182-day notice period, the need for detailed medical expert review, and the complexity of calculating lifetime damages for a child.
Many birth injury cases take two to four years from the initial consultation through resolution, depending on whether the case settles or proceeds to trial in Macomb County Circuit Court or another jurisdiction.
What if I signed a consent form before the delivery?
Signing a consent form before delivery does not waive your child’s right to a birth injury claim. Informed consent covers the known risks of a properly performed procedure, not the consequences of a provider’s negligence.
If the injury resulted from a deviation in care rather than a recognized complication of the delivery method, the consent form does not protect the provider.
What is the difference between a birth injury and a birth defect?
A birth injury results from something that happened during pregnancy, labor, or delivery, typically caused by a medical error or trauma during the birthing process. A birth defect is a structural or functional abnormality that develops during fetal growth and is not caused by the actions of a healthcare provider.
Birth injury claims involve medical negligence. Birth defect cases generally do not, unless a provider failed to diagnose the condition when testing or screening should have detected it.
What if I am not sure whether my child’s condition was caused by a delivery error?
Many parents do not know whether their child’s condition resulted from a delivery error or a natural complication. That uncertainty is common and does not prevent you from having your case reviewed.
A birth trauma lawyer at Goodman Acker obtains the medical records, has them reviewed by a qualified physician, and gives you a direct answer about whether the evidence supports a claim. That review costs you nothing.
My baby spent time in the NICU after delivery. Does that mean malpractice happened?
Not necessarily. NICU admission alone does not prove medical negligence. However, an unexpected NICU stay following a delivery where complications arose may indicate that something went wrong during labor.
If the medical records show that providers missed warning signs or delayed intervention, a birth injury attorney in Sterling Heights reviews those records to determine whether the NICU stay resulted from preventable errors.
How much does it cost to have a birth injury case reviewed?
Goodman Acker reviews birth injury cases at no charge during the initial consultation. If we take your case, we handle it on a contingency fee basis.
You pay no attorney fees unless we recover compensation for your child. We also cover the cost of obtaining medical records and consulting with physician reviewers during the case evaluation process.
What if my child’s doctor says the injury was unavoidable?
A doctor’s statement that the injury was unavoidable does not end the inquiry. Physicians who provide care during delivery have a natural interest in defending their own conduct.
An independent review of the labor and delivery records, fetal monitoring strips, and nursing notes by a separate medical professional often reveals a different picture than what the treating physician described to the family.
Protect Your Child’s Legal Rights with a Sterling Heights Birth Injury Lawyer
The medical records from your child’s delivery contain the answers your family needs. Those records show what the monitors detected, when the medical team responded, and whether the decisions made during labor met the standard of care.
An independent physician review of those records is the only way to separate what the hospital told you from what actually happened.
Goodman Acker represents birth injury families from our Sterling Heights office at 13854 Lakeside Circle. We obtain and review the complete delivery records, consult with physicians in the relevant specialty, and give you an honest assessment of whether your child’s injury resulted from a preventable error.
Every consultation is confidential, and you pay no attorney fees unless we recover compensation for your child. Call 248-483-5000 to start the medical records review process and get answers for your family.
LEGALLY REVIEWED BY BARRY J. GOODMAN
Barry J. Goodman has devoted his professional life to keeping courthouse doors open for victims seeking justice. Always a tireless advocate for his own clients, Goodman sees his responsibility as a Detroit personal injury attorney in a broader sense as well. [ Attorney Bio ]
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