Twin Sisters Disabled by Medical Malpractice: €3.6 Million Compensation Awarded

How much can a family be filled with joy at the news that soon it will be cheered by the birth of twins?

In southern Italy there is this family, destined soon to increase in number. Happiness is always at its maximum when knowing of the arrival of a newborn in the house, but knowing that they will be two and also twins, can only be a real triumph.

Unfortunately, the two little sisters will see the light but with a serious mental retardation and a spastic paresis that will prevent them forever from playing and chasing each other happily, filling the rooms of the house with the vague first and the laughter then. They will not be able to share the magical existence that unites the twins, and they will never know how quickly the joy of their arrival has turned into suffering and anguish for their future.

Pregnant mother has a sickness

In January1995 the pregnant mother goes to the hospital because she suffers symptoms of a severe discomfort in the stomach, a rather common ailment in her state.

Upon her arrival the midwife is waiting for her. She will have to take care of her during the planned birth in the following months. Actually the situation already seems urgent, and there is the threat of premature birth, but the midwifeseems to take things a little lightly.Obstetric monitoring, crucial to observe the health of the fetus,is performed with much carelessness.

In fact, a situation of fetal suffering goes unnoticed, which will prove dramatically decisive for the lives of the twins and their parents. If the midwife had noticed something was wrong, she would have had to notify the doctor immediately. Instead, she keeps doing several things at once and doesn't realize that something is not going right.

The birth is eventually performed in August as planned, but the twins are born with spastic tetraparesis resulting from the lack of oxygen suffered inside the womb. Their limbs remain stiff and the muscles become paralyzed, only complex surgical operations can return a minimum relief.

Pregnancy negligence compensation

At first the family closes in great despair. How are they going to handle not one but two daughters with mental retardation and movement disorders? How will they bear the costs of visits, operations and all the orthopedic subsidies they will need as prams and special beds?

Their serious condition does not allow them to walk or do anythingon their own, and at home there is barely room for four self-sufficient people.

Of course, the support of the couple’s relatives is not lacking, but the fear of a dark future in which the only leisure out of the house will be trips to hospitals, is throwing parents into the abyss of despair.

How different was the future they had imagined for their little ones.

Childbirth medical malpractice claim

The family is not wealthy. At least, it's not anymore. The money that would have been enough to raise two little girls, scraped together with difficulty, is now barely enough to cover the medical expenses and equipment that the twins continually need.

For this reason the two parents are forced to wait so long before deciding to go to a lawyer, they were afraid of not being able to pay the legal costs.

The worm of doubt, however, devours their consciences. If the doctors and midwife had done their job well, now the family would be happy.

cerebral palsy birth injury lawsuit

In cases like these one, it is essential to choose the experienced malpractice lawyer in Rome who knows the meanderings of clinical malpractice and knows the right steps are. Above all, he will know if there is still time to get justice.

Indeed the two parents, oppressed by everyday life, waited four years before going to the lawyer, who warned them that a few more months and their right to compensation would be prescribed.

The lawyer is studying the case and seeking compensation for damages to health. The first fault lies with the midwife who had carried out the monitoring and had not noticed the fetal suffering. Then, the finger is pointed against doctors who knew the situation and did not warn the mother of the risks in which she would run into the pregnancy. Finally, doctors who gave birth to the little ones, who were not provided with the necessary emergency care.

The mystery of the disappearing log

Building the parents' defense has not proved easy for lawyers. They even had to resort to a defensive ploy in order to obtain the hospital registry, a kind of daily diarywhere all the cares performed to a certain patient are logged in.

Asked about by the lawyers who would have acquired it as evidence of malpractice, the hospital replied that it was no longer there. The lawyers then had to make an exposé to the Sostituto Procuratore della Repubblica Italiana, who ordered procurement of hospital record of allgynecological patients visited in the hospital in the months between January and June of the year 1995.

Along with this record, strangely the mother's personal hospital registry also popped up.

Damages for disabled child due to medical error

Fortunately, justice triumphed immediately. The proceedings at first instance sentenced the parents and children to be awarded for compensatory damages amounting three million and six hundred thousand euros. This was the conclusion of a civil judgment that began in 2007. In 2018, the Appeal upheld the Court's ruling.

However, the family, was a bit discouraged by the much time spent among lawyers and courts. Plus, they know well how hard it is to cope with the maintenance costs of two girls with disabilities.

For this reason, after the justice recognized their right to compensatory damages to the health of their poor child, they entered into agreement with the Hospital Authority to receive a sum less below the awarded one but delivered much before the expected times.

Instead of three million and six thousand euros to be paid in years, they accepted two million and three hundred thousand euros to be paid immediately.

Part with the help of the insurance funds that covers the damages committed by hospitals, and partly by the hospital cash budget.

The hospital ran out of money

Unfortunately it is not the only case of twins who have been left forever disabled due to a mistake made by doctors in the phase of childbirth. And unfortunately it's not even the only case involving the same hospital.

Other two twins, now twelve, were destined to born safe and health and because of medical malpractice they struggle with mental and physical retardation.

In this case too, the costs of managing them are very high and the solidarity of grandparents is indispensable.

The Tribunal recognized the negligence of the doctors, and ordered the hospital to compensate more than one million euros for the health damages caused during pregnancy.