A mother from Ohio sued the MetroHealth Medical Center near Cleveland in addition to one of the doctors and recovered a $14.5 million settlement. The mother, a woman with the initial S.S., sued both the hospital and the doctor after a birth injury that caused her child to suffer a brain hemorrhage.

The child is now 11-years-old, but is mentally disabled due to the doctor's negligence on the day of his birth. Allegedly, the child's delivery was delayed when his mother was in labor, which is what caused the brain hemorrhage. The child now has cerebral palsy, cognitive delays, visual impairments and other issues that will require his mother to provide lifelong care.

Cerebral palsy is a common and devastating result of a birth injury or a negligent delivery. When individuals are not actively seeking the health of the child and mother during the delivery, these sorts of devastating mistakes can lead to a lifetime of suffering.

Prior to delivery, S.S. went into labor three times. Each time she was admitted to the MetroHealth hospital and the labor was stopped with medication. She was put on bed rest for the duration of her pregnancy. S.S. claims that she should have been kept in the hospital instead of being sent home to cope with her difficult pregnancy on her own.

According to reports, S.S. first filed a lawsuit against the hospital in 2004 shortly after her son was born. The child was delivered via an emergency C-section at 32 weeks, which is about five weeks before she would have been considered full term. Her water broke and she was taken to the hospital, where she asked that she be able to deliver the baby right away. Instead, the hospital staff said that she needed to wait.

About five hours after she was admitted to the hospital, an obstetrician visited S.S., and she repeated her request to deliver the baby. He claimed that the monitors showed that the baby was healthy. Several hours later, the monitors indicated signs of distress and S.S. had an emergency C-section. The child had had a massive brain hemorrhage. This could have possibly been avoided if the doctor had allowed a C-section earlier in the day.

The hospital claimed that the baby was premature and nothing could have changed his condition. However, the jury in the case determined that there was medical negligence because S.S. was not informed that there was a risk for a brain hemorrhage. She was not given options and her request for a C-section was not granted. The jury awarded her $8 million for the cost of future care and $5 million for her son's pain and suffering. She also received $1 million for the cost of services and $500,000 to cover past economic lawsuits. The awards will be paid jointly by the doctor targeted in the suit and the hospital.