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Whitehouse v Jordan [1981] 1 All ER 267: The claimant was a baby who suffered severe brain damage after a difficult birth. The defendant, a senior hospital registrar, was supervising delivery in a high-risk pregnancy. After the mother had been in labour for 22 hours, the defendant used forceps to assist the delivery. The Lords found that the doctor's standard of care did not fall below that of a reasonable doctor in the circumstances and so the baby was awarded no compensation.
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Midwifery is the health science and health profession that deals with pregnancy, childbirth, and the postpartum period, in addition to the sexual and reproductive health of women throughout their lives. In many countries, midwifery is a medical profession. A professional in midwifery is known as a midwife.
A plaintiff is the party who initiates a lawsuit before a court. By doing so, the plaintiff seeks a legal remedy. If this search is successful, the court will issue judgment in favor of the plaintiff and make the appropriate court order. "Plaintiff" is the term used in civil cases in most English-speaking jurisdictions, the notable exceptions being England and Wales, where a plaintiff has, since the introduction of the Civil Procedure Rules in 1999, been known as a "claimant" and Scotland, where the party has always been known as the "pursuer". In criminal cases, the prosecutor brings the case against the defendant, but the key complaining party is often called the "complainant".
Caesarean section, also known as C-section, cesarean, or caesarean delivery, is the surgical procedure by which one or more babies are delivered through an incision in the mother's abdomen. It is often performed because vaginal delivery would put the mother or child at risk. Reasons for the operation include obstructed labor, twin pregnancy, high blood pressure in the mother, breech birth, shoulder presentation, and problems with the placenta or umbilical cord. A caesarean delivery may be performed based upon the shape of the mother's pelvis or history of a previous C-section. A trial of vaginal birth after C-section may be possible. The World Health Organization recommends that caesarean section be performed only when medically necessary.
Childbirth, also known as labour, parturition and delivery, is the completion of pregnancy where one or more babies exits the internal environment of the mother via vaginal delivery or caesarean section. In 2019, there were about 140.11 million human births globally. In the developed countries, most deliveries occur in hospitals, while in the developing countries most are home births.
The Doctors' Trial was the first of 12 trials for war crimes of high-ranking German officials and industrialists that the United States authorities held in their occupation zone in Nuremberg, Germany, after the end of World War II. These trials were held before US military courts, not before the International Military Tribunal, but took place in the same rooms at the Palace of Justice. The trials are collectively known as the "subsequent Nuremberg trials", formally the "Trials of War Criminals before the Nuremberg Military Tribunals" (NMT).
A breech birth is when a baby is born bottom first instead of head first, as is normal. Around 3–5% of pregnant women at term have a breech baby. Due to their higher than average rate of possible complications for the baby, breech births are generally considered higher risk. Breech births also occur in many other mammals such as dogs and horses, see veterinary obstetrics.
Labor induction is the process or treatment that stimulates childbirth and delivery. Inducing (starting) labor can be accomplished with pharmaceutical or non-pharmaceutical methods. In Western countries, it is estimated that one-quarter of pregnant women have their labor medically induced with drug treatment. Inductions are most often performed either with prostaglandin drug treatment alone, or with a combination of prostaglandin and intravenous oxytocin treatment.
Bolam v Friern Hospital Management Committee [1957] 1 WLR 582 is an English tort law case that lays down the typical rule for assessing the appropriate standard of reasonable care in negligence cases involving skilled professionals such as doctors. This rule is known as the Bolam test, and states that if a doctor reaches the standard of a responsible body of medical opinion, they are not negligent. Bolam was rejected in the 2015 Supreme Court decision of Montgomery v Lanarkshire Health Board in matters of informed consent.
A nuchal cord is when the umbilical cord becomes wrapped around the fetus's neck. Symptoms present in the baby shortly after birth from a prior nuchal cord may include duskiness of face, facial petechia, and bleeding in the whites of the eye. Complications can include meconium, respiratory distress, anemia, and stillbirth. Multiple wraps are associated with greater risk.
Postterm pregnancy is when a woman has not yet delivered her baby after 42 weeks of gestation, two weeks beyond the typical 40-week duration of pregnancy. Postmature births carry risks for both the mother and the baby, including fetal malnutrition, meconium aspiration syndrome, and stillbirths. After the 42nd week of gestation, the placenta, which supplies the baby with nutrients and oxygen from the mother, starts aging and will eventually fail. Postterm pregnancy is a reason to induce labor.
United States v. Grubbs, 547 U.S. 90 (2006), was a case decided by the Supreme Court of the United States involving the constitutionality of "anticipatory" search warrants under the Fourth Amendment to the United States Constitution. The Court ruled that such warrants, which are issued in advance of a "triggering condition" that makes them executable, are constitutional and do not need to describe that condition on their face.
Silent birth, sometimes known as quiet birth, is a birthing procedure advised by L. Ron Hubbard and advocated by Scientologists in which "everyone attending the birth should refrain from spoken words as much as possible" and where "... chatty doctors and nurses, shouts to 'PUSH, PUSH' and loud or laughing remarks to 'encourage' are avoided". According to Scientology doctrine, this is because "any words spoken are recorded in the reactive mind and can have an aberrative effect on the mother and the child." Hubbard asserted that not maintaining verbal silence during childbirth could adversely affect the child later in life. Church members believe that noises, sounds and words while a child is being born can possibly cause trauma, which in turn causes the production of engrams, thus necessitating silent birth. Scientologists believe that it is also a way to assist a newborn in his or her development spiritually.
Caesarean delivery on maternal request (CDMR) is a caesarean section birth requested by the pregnant woman without a medical reason.
The Portland Hospital for Women and Children is a private maternity hospital on Great Portland Street, City of Westminster, London, England, owned by the Hospital Corporation of America.
Obstetrical forceps are a medical instrument used in childbirth. Their use can serve as an alternative to the ventouse method.
Wrongful birth is a legal cause of action in some common law countries in which the parents of a congenitally diseased child claim that their doctor failed to properly warn of their risk of conceiving or giving birth to a child with serious genetic or congenital abnormalities. Thus, the plaintiffs claim, the defendant prevented them from making a truly informed decision as to whether or not to have the child. Wrongful birth is a type of medical malpractice tort. It is distinguished from wrongful life, in which the child sues the doctor.
Madrigal v. Quilligan was a federal class action lawsuit from Los Angeles County, California, involving sterilization of Latina women that occurred either without informed consent, or through coercion. Although the judge ruled in favor of the doctors, the case led to better informed consent for patients, especially those who are not native English speakers.
Prolonged labor is the inability of a woman to proceed with childbirth upon going into labor. Prolonged labor typically lasts over 20 hours for first time mothers, and over 14 hours for women that have already had children. Failure to progress can take place during two different phases; the latent phase and active phase of labor. The latent phase of labor can be emotionally tiring and cause fatigue, but it typically does not result in further problems. The active phase of labor, on the other hand, if prolonged, can result in long term complications.
Akamai Technologies, Inc. v. Limelight Networks, Inc., 797 F.3d 1020, is a 2015 en banc decision of the United States Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit, on remand from a 2014 decision of the U.S. Supreme Court reversing a previous Federal Circuit decision in the case. This is the most recent in a string of decisions in the case that concern the proper legal standard for determining patent infringement liability when multiple actors are involved in carrying out the claimed infringement of a method patent and no single accused infringer has performed all of the steps. In the 2015 remand decision, the Federal Circuit expanded the scope of vicarious liability in such cases, holding that one actor could be held liable for the acts of another actor "when an alleged infringer conditions participation in an activity or receipt of a benefit upon performance of a step or steps of a patented method and establishes the manner or timing of that performance." In addition, the court held that where multiple "actors form a joint enterprise, all can be charged with the acts of the other[s], rendering each liable for the steps performed by the other[s] as if each is a single actor."
The Country Doctor is a 1936 American drama film directed by Henry King and written by Sonya Levien. The film stars Jean Hersholt, June Lang, Slim Summerville, Michael Whalen, Dorothy Peterson and Robert Barrat. The Country Doctor was released on March 12, 1936, by 20th Century Fox.