Birth isn’t very comfortable for the mom-to-be. Natural childbirth is already painful, and sometimes things take a turn for the worse – when the baby gets stuck on the way out!

Shoulder dystocia is a major delivery complication that happens when the baby’s shoulder gets stuck on mom’s pelvis. In this video, birth injury attorney Laura Brown explains the methods doctors try to get the baby out safely without causing harm to baby or mother.

It’s a shocking fact, but almost every case of birth-related brachial plexus injury could have been prevented.

The brachial plexus is a cluster of nerves right behind the collarbone, feeding a person’s shoulder, arm, wrist, and hand. It is especially vulnerable to doctors pulling or turning a baby’s head during delivery. In cases of shoulder dystocia (where the baby’s shoulder is stuck on the mother’s pelvic bone) the rate of BPI increases one hundred-fold!

That’s why doctors have to be so careful to prevent these injuries. Birth injury attorney Laura Brown discusses the basics of a brachial plexus injury and what can – and should – be done to prevent them.

Medical science is a wonderful thing. It keeps marching on, giving us new ways to keep mothers and babies safe during childbirth. The electronic fetal heart monitor is one such tool that hospitals use to measure a baby’s vital statistics during labor.

And if the heart monitor strip shows an abnormal heart rate…it’s probably time for medical intervention.

In this video, birth injury attorney Laura Brown stresses the need for medical providers to pay attention to the fetal heart monitor, and when a C-section is necessary to prevent birth injury to a baby.