A seven year old boy, who was born with spastic cerebral palsy due to the negligence of nursing staff prior to his delivery, has had a partial settlement of more than one million Euros approved in the High Court in his birth injury negligence lawsuit.
Shane Kenny of Ballyduff, County Waterford, sued the Health Service Executive through his mother Catherine, due to alleged negligence in the time leading up to his birth at the Erinville Hospital, County Cork, on November 2nd 2004.
In the birth injury negligence lawsuit, Mr Justice John Quirke at the High Court heard that there had been a failure to act on the results of a cardiotocogragh trace (CTG) which showed that the boy´s foetal heart rate was abnormal. Due to this oversight, Shane was delivered using forceps, which resulted in a partial hypoxic event.
The court was told that, although Shane is able to attend mainstream education, he is not expected to sit State exams and will never be capable of independent living.
Liability for Shane’s birth negligence injury was admitted by the Health Service Executive, and an interim settlement award of 1,004,000 Euros had been agreed between the parties to cover past costs and expenses, and to provide care and education for Shane for the next two years.
While approving the birth negligence settlement, Mr Justice John Quirke stated that he hoped legislation would be introduced within the next two years to facilitate periodic payments to those who had suffered catastrophic injury. The birth negligence settlement does not account for Shane’s future loss of earnings, which will be decided upon in a hearing to be scheduled next year.