$4.75 Million - Infant [Redacted] v. Dr. [Redacted]

In the fall of 2003, Anthony T. DiPietro teamed up with David L. Taback, to litigate the case of an infant who sustained hypoxia, a lack of oxygen, to his brain during delivery. As a result of this collaborative effort, a four million seven hundred fifty thousand dollar settlement was procured on behalf of the infant plaintiff and his family.

The child's mother arrived at [Redacted] Hospital in the afternoon of January 26, 1993 with contractions but her water had not yet broke. She was placed on external fetal monitoring at 5 p.m. that evening which showed some suspicious decelerations of the fetal heart rate to 100 beats per minute. The mother was then placed on her left side to attempt intrauterine resuscitation of her baby. Amazingly, the external fetal monitoring machine which was being used to assess the child in utero was then "turned off" by a nurse around midnight.

Fetal heart rate monitoring was then resumed at 3:05 a.m., and Justin's mother was again immediately placed on her other side and given supplemental oxygen. Justin's mother was then finally sent to the labor and delivery floor at 4 a.m. with a notation of “suspicious tracings” in her chart. Continued monitoring at 7 a.m. revealed fetal heart rate tachycardia followed by more late decelerations. Once again, the monitoring was inexplicably turned off by a doctor.

This baby was ultimately born by cesarean section, but not until 4:43 that afternoon. His blood work indicated a significant lack of oxygen in his blood during the labor and delivery period. Our obstetrical expert in this case stated, and was prepared to testify before the court, that the care and treatment rendered to this mother was "disgusting".

If this case had gone to trial, the defense lawyers were going to try to use the results of a blood test performed several hours after the delivery as part of their defense that the child's oxygenation level was not abnormal at the time of his birth.

This is just another example of how defendant doctors and their lawyers in medical malpractice cases will "never" admit their responsibility for causing harm to their patients. Only a very careful review of volumes of medical records and barely decipherable handwriting revealed documented proof that the infant was deprived of oxygen at the time of his birth due to the defendant's failure to perform an earlier cesarean section.

All of the money received for this child has been placed into special investment instruments that are backed by the Federal Government. Further, the access to this money is restricted by the Court so that it can only be used for this child's personal care and treatment. As a result, there will be enough money to take care of him until the end of his natural life, even if he were to out-live all of his family members and relatives.