Heather Hansen recently obtained a defense verdict on behalf of an obstetrician in Philadelphia. In this case, Plaintiffs alleged negligence in relation to labor and delivery at a Philadelphia hospital. Plaintiffs claimed that the defendant failed to recognize and interpret the signs and symptoms of placental abruption, failed to diagnose and treat placental abruption, failed to timely respond to signs of fetal distress, and delayed in the performance of a cesarean section. Plaintiff produced an obstetrics and gynecology expert that criticized the time the cesarean section was called, and opined that the delivery should have been called 16 to 18 minutes earlier. The defense maintained that the obstetrical team recognized and responded to the fetal bradycardia immediately, and performed all necessary resuscitative measures in an attempt to regulate the fetal heart rate, before calling an emergent cesarean section. The baby was delivered within ten minutes from the time the attending obstetrician called the emergency cesarean section.
After a three day trial and brief deliberation, the jury returned a verdict in favor of the attending obstetrician.