Infant Brain Damage

Infant brain damage is a broad term for injury to a newborn's brain. Causes include a lack of oxygen or blood flow around the time of delivery (often called hypoxic-ischemic encephalopathy, or HIE), bleeding in the brain, severe untreated jaundice, infections such as meningitis, and physical trauma during a difficult delivery. Premature babies are at higher risk for several of these.

The long-term effects range from mild learning difficulties to severe disability. The best-known outcome is cerebral palsy, a group of disorders affecting movement and posture. The National Institute of Neurological Disorders and Stroke explains that some cerebral palsy results from brain injury before, during, or after birth, including a lack of oxygen, and that cerebral palsy is the leading cause of childhood disabilities in the United States. Many cases, though, come from brain development problems in the womb that no one caused.

Legal claims over infant brain damage usually take two forms:

• Medical malpractice, alleging that doctors or nurses missed signs of fetal distress, delayed a needed cesarean section, or mishandled complications. These are individual cases with state-specific rules, damage caps, and deadlines.
• Product liability, where a product given to a premature baby is alleged to have caused harm. Lawsuits over cow's milk based formula for premature infants allege it caused necrotizing enterocolitis (NEC), a serious bowel disease.

Deadlines for injuries to children are often extended, but not in every state or for every claim. See our pages on baby formula NEC lawsuits and how to sue a company. This page is general information, not medical advice.