Mum Sues Hospital For $16 Million After Baby “Pushed Back Inside Her”

A mother has been awarded $16 million after she was left permanently injured and suffering a post-traumatic stress disorder after her baby was “pushed back inside her” during delivery.

Caroline Malatesta had already given birth to three children so she knew what might happen during her fourth, but she never thought this experience would be any expectant mother’s nightmare.

She and her husband, J.T. Malatesta had chosen Brookwood Baptist Medical Center in Birmingham, AL, for her fourth, because it promoted a natural birth experience. However, when the time for her labour came, the nurse changed her birth plan.

Caroline wrote about her experience for Cosmopolitan magazine. She wrote:

“When I walked into my birthing room, the nurse told me to go to the bathroom right away, because I wouldn’t be able to get out of the bed for maybe for the rest of labor,” she wrote.

“I told her that my doctor said I’d have wireless monitoring and that I would be able to be mobile, but the nurse said my doctor wasn’t on call. From that point on, it became a back-and-forth of “But my doctor said I could” and “But you don’t get to.” The nurse treated me like a disobedient child!”

The situation worsened when Caroline was forced to do a position after she felt more comfortable on her hands and knees.

“The nurse told me to get on my back. I stayed on my hands and knees and breathed, trying to relax, as that is what came naturally to me. But the nurse pulled my wrist out from under me and flipped me over on to my back! “

However, what came next is just terrible for any mother who knows what it’s like to have a baby.

“Then another nurse held my baby’s head into my vagina to prevent him from being delivered. The nurses were holding me down, and I was struggling “” really struggling. I grabbed the side of the bed, and at one point, I even put my foot up against the nurse’s shoulder and face to try and get leverage to flip back over, but was unsuccessful,” she wrote.

She said that this grueling moment lasted for six minutes, which in birthing time feels like about six hours. Then, the doctor arrived, prompting the nurse to let go of the baby’s head.

“I felt immediate relief, because that deep pressure of her holding the head in against the force of my contractions was finally released. That’s why I’m so horribly injured, because she kept holding the baby in,” she said.

Caroline said that she had spent six months in pain, that she described as ‘worse than labour’ after the traumatic experience. Up until today, she said she still suffers from chronic nerve pain and PTSD.

She filed a malpractice lawsuit against the hospital and after two years, the court concluded that the trauma was a  “direct result of misrepresentation” by the hospital and she was awarded $16 million.

“The hospital made it very clear they were uninterested in settling. I don’t think they took me seriously. I think a lot of times hospitals think it’s just “silly women” who want their “silly birth experience.” But it’s more than that. These women that are making these choices are making real, medical decisions!” she wrote.

“This verdict is a wake-up call for hospitals that don’t take women seriously. It’s a wake-up call that they need to review the way they’ve been doing things and make changes. Sadly, I think it took this verdict to make them wake up.”

Despite the ordeal, she now reserves her energy for ‘the important things’. “And then I just focused on my baby, my son, Jack “” the best part of all of this,” she said.

Source: Kidspot.com.au and Cosmopolitan.com