Erb’s Palsy Lawyers Representing Children and Families

What Is Erb’s Palsy?

Erb’s palsy is the most common form of brachial plexus birth palsy. The brachial plexus carries signals between the spinal cord and the shoulder, arm, wrist, hand, and fingers. Damage to these nerves can reduce movement or feeling in part of the affected arm.

Erb’s palsy generally involves the upper portion of the brachial plexus, especially the C5 and C6 cervical nerve roots. A child may have weakness in the shoulder and elbow while retaining more movement in the wrist and fingers. Injuries that extend farther through the nerve network can affect the forearm, wrist, hand, and grip.

Possible Signs of a Brachial Plexus Birth Injury

A newborn with Erb’s palsy may hold one arm against their body, move that arm less than the other, or have difficulty raising their shoulder and bending their elbow. The arm may appear limp or rotated inward. Some children also have reduced sensation, an abnormal reflex, or weakness in their wrist and hand.

Doctors diagnose brachial plexus birth palsy through the birth history and examinations that track movement, strength, reflexes, and sensation. Imaging may help evaluate the shoulder, bones, and nerve roots. Nerve testing may provide more information in some cases.

How Severe Can the Nerve Injury Be?

The American Academy of Orthopaedic Surgeons describes four general nerve injuries related to Erb’s palsy:

• Avulsion: separation of the nerve root from the spinal cord
• Neurapraxia: a stretch injury, but the nerve remains intact
• Neuroma: scar tissue from damaged nerve fibers interferes with movement signals
• Rupture: tears the nerve completely

Multiple types of nerve damage can even occur in the same arm. The type and extent of the injury affect the child’s recovery and treatment.

When Can Erb’s Palsy Be a Birth Injury Claim?

Erb’s palsy may occur when the baby’s neck and shoulder are forced apart enough to stretch or tear the brachial plexus during delivery. Shoulder dystocia is an important setting for that injury. It occurs when the baby’s shoulders do not deliver after the head, creating an obstetric emergency that requires the team to act quickly and carefully.

Brachial plexus palsy can occur when no shoulder dystocia was documented, when no known risk factor was present, or even during a cesarean delivery. A difficult birth and an Erb’s palsy diagnosis, therefore, do not prove malpractice on their own. The claim depends upon what the team knew, how the delivery unfolded, and whether negligent force or another lapse in care caused the injury.

What an Erb’s Palsy Claim Must Establish

A medical malpractice claim requires evidence that a provider failed to meet the accepted standard of care and that the failure caused or worsened the child’s injury. Qualified obstetric and pediatric specialists review the records to address both questions.

Specialists consider which nerve roots were affected, whether fractures or bruising occurred, how the arm was positioned at birth, and how recovery progressed. Their opinions must also account for other reasonable explanations.

Shoulder Dystocia and Medical Negligence

Shoulder dystocia often happens without warning. Risk factors include a previous shoulder dystocia, suspected high birth weight, maternal diabetes, prolonged labor, and an instrument-assisted delivery. These factors become part of the negligence review, along with when the delivery team learned of them and whether the information should have affected delivery planning.

Delivery Planning and Prenatal Care

An investigation may examine how providers managed diabetes, tracked fetal growth, evaluated a baby estimated to be unusually large, and responded to a prior shoulder dystocia. Physicians reviewing the case ask whether the available information called for a different plan or a fuller discussion of delivery options.

Estimated fetal weight has limits, and a large baby alone does not establish negligence. Physicians reviewing the case consider the complete clinical picture and the guidance that applied at the time.

Responding to Shoulder Dystocia

Once shoulder dystocia occurs, the delivery team must recognize it, call for help, communicate clearly, and use appropriate maneuvers. Common responses include bringing the mother’s knees toward her chest in the McRoberts maneuver, applying suprapubic pressure, using internal rotational maneuvers, or delivering the posterior arm. The circumstances determine which maneuvers are appropriate and in what order.

The team should document when the head delivered, when shoulder dystocia was recognized, which maneuvers were attempted, and when the body delivered. The timeline can be crucial because excessive downward or sideways traction on the baby’s head may stretch the nerves in the neck.

Forceps, Vacuums, and Traction

Forceps or a vacuum may be used for reasons unrelated to shoulder dystocia, and their use alone does not prove negligence. Physicians reviewing the case examine why an instrument was selected, how many attempts were made, and what happened after the head delivered.

Delivery notes may not specify the exact amount or direction of traction. Attorneys compare the written chart with testimony, newborn examinations, photographs, imaging, and the pattern of the nerve injury.

Experienced attorneys know which records to obtain, what gaps to look for, and which medical specialists should review the case. The Erb’s palsy lawyers at The Yost Legal Group can take on that work while parents care for their newborn child.

How Erb’s Palsy Lawyers Investigate Medical Negligence

Parents may remember a doctor calling for help, nurses moving quickly, or someone pressing above the mother’s pelvic bone. They may remember very few details about the day their baby was born. The investigation should rest upon the medical evidence, not on a parent’s ability to recall unfamiliar medical events during an emergency.

The Erb’s palsy attorneys at The Yost Legal Group begin with the family’s account and the child’s condition after birth because the parents’ perspective matters. Parents rarely know the names of the instruments or maneuvers used during a delivery emergency. The records and other evidence can supply those details.

Our experienced lawyers identify the prenatal, labor, delivery, and newborn records needed to build a detailed timeline. We compare that timeline with the family’s account, the newborn examinations, and the pattern of injury to determine what the evidence supports.

Medical Records and Evidence

Evidence may include prenatal records, growth estimates, diabetes testing, labor notes, fetal monitoring, delivery and operative reports, instrument logs, newborn examinations, photographs, specialist evaluations, therapy records, and imaging.

The records may show a documented shoulder dystocia, a sequence of maneuvers, the interval between delivery of the head and body, an arm that did not move normally at birth, or an associated clavicle or humerus fracture. Missing details can also matter when hospital policy or accepted practices called for a complete delivery note.

Medical Experts and Causation

An obstetrician may evaluate delivery planning, the response to shoulder dystocia, instrument use, and traction. A pediatric neurologist, orthopedic surgeon, plastic surgeon, or brachial plexus specialist may assess the location and severity of the nerve damage. Therapists can explain the child’s movement, function, and progress.

The experts then connect the obstetric evidence with the medical injury. They consider whether the nerve damage is consistent with the forces described in the delivery record, whether an alternative mechanism is supported, and whether appropriate care could have prevented or reduced the harm.

Treatment and Recovery After an Erb’s Palsy Diagnosis

Recovery varies with the location and severity of the nerve injury. Many babies with a mild stretch injury regain movement as the nerve heals. Children with a rupture, avulsion, or injury involving more of the brachial plexus may continue to have weakness or limited motion as they grow.

According to the American Academy of Orthopaedic Surgeons, physical therapy and range-of-motion exercises are central parts of care. A brachial plexus team may follow arm function over time. When recovery is limited, specialists may discuss nerve grafting, nerve transfer, tendon transfer, joint procedures, or other surgery.

Treatment decisions belong to the child’s medical team. A lawyer’s role is to understand the care already provided and the services the child is reasonably expected to need.

How Erb’s Palsy May Affect a Child’s Future Needs

A lasting brachial plexus injury can affect strength, motion, sensation, coordination, and growth of the affected arm. Some children adapt with modest support. Others need ongoing therapy, surgery, splinting, pain management, or help with daily activities.

Future needs should be based upon the individual child. Medical specialists, therapists, life-care planners, and economists can evaluate expected treatment, equipment, practical support, and costs as the child grows.

Compensation in an Erb’s Palsy Birth Injury Claim

When medical negligence causes a brachial plexus birth injury, a legal recovery can provide resources for treatment and long-term support. The available damages depend upon the evidence and the law that applies to the case.

An Erb’s palsy lawsuit may seek compensation for:

• Past and future medical treatment
• Physical and occupational therapy
• Nerve, tendon, orthopedic, or other surgery
• Braces, splints, adaptive equipment, and assistive technology
• Pain management and rehabilitation
• Educational or vocational support
• Lost future earning capacity
• Pain, suffering, and other legally recoverable damages

The value of a claim depends upon the severity and permanence of the injury, the child’s expected needs, the strength of the liability evidence, and the governing law.

Birth Injury Results Obtained by The Yost Legal Group

The Yost Legal Group’s published birth injury results include, but are not limited to, a $5,000,000 cerebral palsy settlement after a difficult twin delivery, a $5,000,000 HIE settlement involving fetal distress and a delayed emergency cesarean section, and a $4,000,000 HIE settlement involving an artificial rupture of membranes, loss of the fetal heart rate on the monitor, and a delayed emergency response.

Each case involved allegations that medical negligence caused the child’s profound brain injury. We resolved all three matters before trial.

Every claim depends upon its own facts, and prior results do not guarantee a similar outcome.

Though these settlements involved conditions and injuries different from Erb’s palsy, they all required careful review of delivery decisions, medical records, expert opinions, and a child’s future needs.

Why Choose The Yost Legal Group for Your Erb’s Palsy Lawsuit?

For nearly 40 years, The Yost Legal Group has represented children and families who have sustained harm due to the negligence of others. Our birth injury team understands that an Erb’s palsy lawsuit requires close attention to both sides of the delivery: the obstetric decisions in the labor room and the child’s nerve injury, treatment, and recovery.

Families work with real people from the first time they call us. Our in-house Intake Team listens and gathers the information needed for an initial review. When we accept a case, our Litigation Team obtains records, builds the delivery timeline, consults qualified medical professionals, and keeps the family informed as the case develops.

Our Baltimore-based firm accepts Erb’s palsy cases from Maryland, Delaware, Illinois, Kentucky, Pennsylvania, Ohio, and many other states. We pursue claims involving hospitals, physicians, nurses, insurers, and other powerful defendants.