Free initial review of your information and available records. No pressure and no promises about the outcome of a potential claim.
Updated August 2026
When a baby suffers a serious injury during labor, delivery, or the newborn period, parents often have more questions than answers.
What happened?
Could it have been prevented?
Which records matter?
Is there a deadline to investigate?
You do not need to have every medical record before contacting a lawyer.
Morrin Law Office can start with the information you already have, identify records that may be important, and discuss whether further medical and legal investigation makes sense.
A difficult delivery, NICU admission, diagnosis, or poor outcome does not automatically mean medical negligence occurred. A birth injury claim requires careful review of the medical evidence, applicable standard of care, causation, and Kentucky law.
Call Morrin Law Office for a free consultation
859-358-0300
214 W Main St., Richmond, KY 40475
You can also use the firm’s online contact form to begin the conversation. Contact Morrin Law Office
What to Have Ready for a Birth Injury Case Review
Send or tell us what you currently know. You do not need to delay contacting the office while waiting for additional records.
Helpful information includes:
- Your name and relationship to the child
- Your phone number and email
- Preferred times to contact you
- Child’s full name and date of birth
- Hospital where labor and delivery occurred
- Date of delivery
- Any hospital where the baby received NICU or specialty care
- Whether the baby was transferred to another hospital
- Names of significant treating physicians or specialists, if known
- Your child’s current diagnoses or medical concerns
- A short description of what happened
- The questions you want answered
If you remember important times, include them.
Examples might include:
- When fetal-heart-rate concerns were first discussed
- When oxytocin/Pitocin was started, reduced, stopped, or restarted
- When a doctor was called to the bedside
- When a C-section was discussed or ordered
- Time of delivery
- Apgar scores
- Whether resuscitation was required
- When NICU care began
- When seizures or neurological concerns developed
- When therapeutic hypothermia or “cooling” began, if applicable
- Bilirubin values and phototherapy times if severe jaundice was involved
- Transport request, departure, and arrival times if the baby was transferred
Approximate times are fine if that is all you remember.
Records You Can Send If You Already Have Them
Useful records may include:
- Hospital discharge instructions
- After-visit summaries
- Labor-and-delivery records
- Fetal-monitoring records
- Medication administration records
- Operative or C-section report
- Anesthesia records
- Apgar scores
- Umbilical cord blood-gas results
- Newborn resuscitation record
- NICU records
- Therapeutic-hypothermia records
- EEG reports
- MRI or head-ultrasound reports
- Neurology records
- Bilirubin laboratory results
- Phototherapy documentation
- Placental pathology report
- Transport records
- Pediatric records
- Physical, occupational, speech, or feeding therapy evaluations
- Early-intervention records
- Developmental evaluations
Do not worry if you have only a few pages.
A complete review often requires records from more than one facility, and the mother’s labor-and-delivery chart is generally separate from the baby’s newborn or NICU chart.
Don’t Have the Medical Records Yet?
That is common.
Kentucky law provides patients a right to request copies of their medical records in writing under KRS 422.317. Kentucky also gives a parent or qualifying personal representative access to the medical record of a patient under age 18, subject to applicable federal and state-law exceptions, under KRS 422.355.
For a birth injury review, it can be helpful to request more than the ordinary discharge packet.
That may include:
- Complete maternal labor-and-delivery chart
- Complete fetal-heart-rate monitoring tracings
- Fetal-monitor annotations and event markers
- Medication administration record
- Oxytocin administration history
- Nursing and physician notes
- Provider-notification documentation
- Anesthesia record
- Operating-room records
- Delivery or operative report
- Placental pathology
- Baby’s complete newborn/NICU chart
- Cord-gas results
- Newborn resuscitation documentation
- EEG and imaging reports
- Laboratory results
- Transport records
Kentucky’s certificate-of-merit statute expressly identifies fetal heart monitor strips among the types of medical records relevant to its record-production provisions.
What About Pump Logs, Audit Trails, or Hospital Policies?
You can ask whether separately retained infusion-pump data, device records, or other electronic data are available.
However, those materials should not be described as though they are automatically included in every ordinary medical-record request.
The same is true of:
- EHR audit trails
- Metadata
- Hospital policies and procedures
- Staffing records
- Internal communications
- Quality-assurance materials
- Separately maintained device logs
Whether those materials are available or legally obtainable depends on the circumstances.
If a potential claim warrants further investigation, an attorney can determine whether additional information should be requested, preserved, or later sought through formal legal procedures.
Information to Include in Your Initial Case Review
You can use the following outline when calling or preparing a written summary.
Parent or Guardian
Name:
Relationship to child:
Phone:
Email:
Best days/times to contact you:
Child
Name:
Date of birth:
Current age:
Current city/county:
Current diagnosis or primary concerns, if known:
Labor and Delivery
Hospital:
City:
Admission date:
Delivery date and time:
Vaginal or C-section delivery:
Vacuum or forceps used, if known:
Were fetal-heart-rate concerns discussed?
Was Pitocin/oxytocin used?
What do you remember happening?
Newborn/NICU Care
NICU admission: Yes / No / Unknown
Resuscitation required: Yes / No / Unknown
Apgar scores, if known:
Cord-gas results, if known:
Seizures or suspected seizures:
EEG performed:
MRI or other brain imaging:
Therapeutic hypothermia/cooling:
Severe jaundice or phototherapy:
Other significant diagnoses:
Transfer to Another Hospital
Was the baby transferred?
Yes / No / Unknown
Sending hospital:
Receiving hospital:
Transport provider, if known:
Approximate departure and arrival times:
Your Main Questions
What concerns you most about the care your family received?
What were you told by the doctors or nurses?
What still does not make sense to you?
Protect Your Child’s Privacy During the Initial Contact
A first case-review conversation does not require you to send every sensitive document you possess.
Start with enough information for the office to understand the general situation.
Avoid putting unnecessary sensitive information into a standard website message, such as:
- Social Security numbers
- Insurance account numbers
- Passwords
- Financial-account information
- Unrelated medical information
- Large collections of medical records unless the firm has instructed you how to transmit them
If records are needed, ask how the office prefers to receive medical documents.
You also do not need to sign broad medical authorizations merely to make an initial phone call. If additional investigation is appropriate, record authorizations and the scope of any requested release can be discussed at that stage.
What Happens After You Request a Review?
1. Initial Conversation
The first step is understanding what happened and what questions you have.
Useful topics may include:
- Pregnancy and prenatal history
- Labor progression
- Fetal monitoring
- Medications
- Operative delivery
- Newborn condition
- Resuscitation
- NICU course
- Neurological findings
- Transfers
- Current diagnoses
- Development and therapy
Not every fact will be known during the first conversation.
That is normal.
2. Identify the Records That Matter
The available information can be used to identify which records should be collected.
For example, a case involving alleged fetal-monitoring problems may require different records from a case involving:
- Delayed C-section
- Vacuum or forceps injury
- Neonatal resuscitation
- HIE
- Newborn seizures
- Severe jaundice or kernicterus
- Infection
- Stroke
- Brachial plexus injury
The objective is to collect the records that can help reconstruct what actually occurred.
3. Reconstruct the Timeline
Birth injury investigations are often easier to understand when events are placed in chronological order.
A timeline may compare:
- Fetal-monitoring changes
- Contractions
- Oxytocin dosing
- Maternal vital signs
- Nursing assessments
- Physician notification
- Provider evaluations
- Decision for operative delivery
- Operating-room events
- Delivery
- Newborn resuscitation
- Cord gases
- NICU treatment
- Neurological findings
- Transfer
- EEG or imaging
- Later diagnosis and treatment
A timeline does not establish malpractice by itself.
It helps identify what happened, what remains unknown, and what questions may require expert review.
4. Evaluate Whether Medical Expert Review Is Appropriate
Most serious birth injury claims involve medical issues outside ordinary knowledge.
Depending on the facts, further investigation may involve physicians or other professionals in areas such as:
- Obstetrics and gynecology
- Maternal-fetal medicine
- Labor-and-delivery nursing
- Neonatology
- Pediatric neurology
- Neuroradiology
- Placental pathology
- Rehabilitation medicine
- Life-care planning
- Economics
Kentucky KRE 702, amended effective July 1, 2024, governs the admissibility of expert testimony. It requires the proponent to demonstrate that qualifying expert testimony is based on sufficient facts or data, uses reliable principles and methods, and reflects a reliable application of those principles and methods to the case.
Expert review is intended to determine what the evidence supports—not to assume that a medical complication automatically resulted from negligence.
5. Evaluate Kentucky Law and Filing Requirements
If the medical evidence supports additional investigation, the legal analysis may include:
- Potential defendants
- Applicable standard of care
- Causation
- Damages
- Medical experts
- Certificate-of-merit requirements
- Statutes of limitation
- Minority tolling
- Wrongful-death rules when applicable
- Whether a state institution or state employee is involved
- The correct court or administrative forum
These issues should be evaluated before relying on any generalized deadline.
Kentucky Birth Injury Deadlines Can Be Complicated
There is no single deadline that can safely be applied to every Kentucky birth injury case.
Private Medical Malpractice Claims
Kentucky’s current KRS 413.140, effective July 15, 2026, generally provides a one-year limitations period for covered negligence or malpractice actions against physicians, surgeons, dentists, and licensed hospitals.
For the covered medical-malpractice claims, the statute says the claim accrues when the injury is first discovered or, through reasonable care, should have been discovered. It also contains a five-year outside provision measured from the alleged negligent act or omission.
That is only part of the analysis.
Claims Belonging to a Minor Child
Kentucky KRS 413.170 provides tolling for certain causes of action when the person entitled to bring the claim was an infant—meaning a minor—when the cause of action accrued.
That can materially affect a child’s own claim.
But parents should not assume that every claim connected with a birth injury remains open until the child becomes an adult.
Separate rules can apply to:
- A parent’s independent claim
- Wrongful death
- Estate claims
- Government defendants
- State institutions
- State employees
- Claims governed by another statutory procedure
Special Rules for State Institutions and State Employees
This distinction can be especially important when care involved a Kentucky state institution of higher education or qualifying state employee.
KRS 49.070 treats state institutions of higher education as state agencies for purposes of Kentucky’s Board of Claims statutes and gives the Board of Claims jurisdiction over specified negligence claims involving the Commonwealth and its agencies, officers, agents, and employees acting within the scope of employment.
The Board of Claims has its own deadline statute.
Under KRS 49.120, claims generally must be filed with the Board within one year after accrual. The statute contains specific provisions for medical-malpractice claims and expressly states that a claimant’s infancy or other legal disability does not extend the Board’s filing period through KRS 413.170.
This is one reason families should not use a generic internet statute-of-limitations rule to decide whether a Kentucky birth injury claim is still timely.
Does Kentucky Require a Certificate of Merit?
For many medical malpractice lawsuits, yes.
KRS 411.167 generally requires a claimant commencing an action covered by KRS 413.140(1)(e) to file a certificate of merit with the complaint.
The statute ordinarily requires review of the facts and consultation with at least one appropriately qualified expert who provides a basis for commencing the action.
The statute also contains exceptions and alternative procedures for specified situations.
That requirement is one reason serious birth injury claims commonly undergo medical expert review before litigation.
Kentucky’s certificate-of-merit requirement should not be confused with the state’s former mandatory medical review panel process.
Frequently Asked Questions
Do I need every medical record before contacting Morrin Law Office?
No.
Start with what you have.
A short description of the birth, your child’s condition, and the hospitals involved may be enough for an initial conversation.
Additional records can be identified after that.
Should I request fetal-monitoring strips?
If fetal status during labor may be relevant, requesting the complete fetal-monitoring record can be important.
Ask for the full tracing, annotations, and event markers rather than only selected screenshots.
KRS 411.167 specifically refers to fetal heart monitor strips in its record-production provisions.
Should I ask for Pitocin or oxytocin pump logs?
Ask for the complete medication administration record and documented oxytocin dose history.
You can also ask whether separately retained infusion-pump data are available.
Do not assume that standalone pump logs are maintained in every case or automatically included in the medical record provided under a routine patient request.
Do I need to know exactly what the hospital did wrong?
No.
Parents are not expected to diagnose medical negligence.
Your role is to explain what happened, what you remember, what your child experienced, and what concerns you.
Determining whether the medical evidence supports a claim may require detailed records and qualified medical experts.
Does a serious diagnosis mean we have a malpractice case?
No.
Conditions such as:
- Cerebral palsy
- HIE
- Neonatal seizures
- Stroke
- Brachial plexus injury
- Kernicterus
- Brain injury
- Developmental disability
can occur for different reasons.
A diagnosis does not by itself prove that a healthcare provider violated the standard of care or caused the injury.
What if we do not know what caused our child’s condition?
That is common.
The purpose of a records and expert review is partly to identify what the evidence supports.
Possible causation evidence can include:
- Prenatal records
- Fetal monitoring
- Maternal condition
- Labor medications
- Cord gases
- Apgar scores
- Resuscitation
- Neurological examinations
- EEG
- MRI
- Placental pathology
- Genetic or metabolic testing
- Infection studies
- Long-term clinical findings
Sometimes an investigation supports a preventable medical cause.
Sometimes it does not.
Do Kentucky birth injury cases require experts?
Most serious birth injury malpractice claims do.
The specialties needed depend on the medical issues.
Kentucky KRE 702 governs the reliability requirements for expert testimony in court.
Is there a one-year deadline?
KRS 413.140 generally contains a one-year limitations period for the covered private medical-malpractice actions, along with discovery language and a five-year outside provision.
But that is not a safe universal answer for every birth injury case.
Minority can affect some claims under KRS 413.170, while state-related claims can be governed by the separate Board of Claims rules in KRS Chapter 49. Wrongful-death and other claims can also require a different analysis.
Have the particular claim and defendants evaluated rather than calculating a deadline from a general website summary.
What if the child died?
Kentucky wrongful-death claims are different from claims belonging to a living injured child.
KRS 411.130 provides that a wrongful-death action is prosecuted by the deceased person’s personal representative.
Do not assume that infancy tolling applicable to a child’s personal claim would apply to an estate or wrongful-death claim.
Prompt legal review is especially important in these circumstances.
Will you tell us what the case is worth during the first call?
Usually there is not enough information to responsibly value a serious birth injury claim from an initial phone call.
Potential value can depend on issues including:
- Liability evidence
- Causation
- Severity and permanence of injury
- Future medical care
- Therapy needs
- Equipment
- Personal-care assistance
- Life expectancy
- Lost earning capacity
- Available defendants
- Insurance or other sources of recovery
- Liens
- Venue
- Expert evidence
Morrin Law Office does not guarantee a settlement, verdict, or specific dollar amount.
Short Medical-Records Request Template
You can use this as a starting point when requesting records.
To: Health Information Management / Medical Records
Hospital: [Hospital Name]Maternal Patient: [Parent’s Full Name]
DOB: [MM/DD/YYYY]
MRN: [if known]Child: [Child’s Full Name]
DOB: [MM/DD/YYYY]
MRN: [if known]Under applicable Kentucky and federal law, including KRS 422.317 and, for my minor child’s records, KRS 422.355, please provide electronic copies of the complete available medical records.
For the maternal labor-and-delivery chart, please include:
- Admission and triage records
- Labor flowsheets
- Nursing and physician notes
- Orders
- Medication administration record
- Oxytocin/Pitocin administration and documented rate changes
- Complete fetal-monitoring tracings with annotations and event markers
- Any separately archived fetal-monitor waveform/data exports that remain available
- Anesthesia record
- Operating-room records and timestamps
- Delivery note
- Operative report
- Placental pathology report, if performed
For the child’s newborn/NICU chart, please include:
- Newborn resuscitation documentation
- Apgar scores
- Cord blood-gas results
- Laboratory results
- Newborn and NICU nursing and physician records
- Medication administration records
- Therapeutic-hypothermia documentation, if applicable
- EEG reports
- Imaging reports
- Bilirubin results
- Phototherapy documentation
- Infection workup
- Consultation notes
- Transport documentation, if maintained
- Discharge records
If separately retained infusion-pump or device data associated with this admission are available for patient release, please advise how they may be requested.
Please advise how the electronic records will be delivered.
Name: ______________________________
Address: ____________________________
Phone: ______________________________
Email: ______________________________
Signature: ___________________________
Date: _______________________________
Kentucky KRS 422.317 provides for a copy of a patient’s medical record upon written request, while KRS 422.355 addresses parental and personal-representative access to a minor patient’s health information, subject to applicable exceptions.
Ready to Request a Birth Injury Case Review?
You do not need to know whether malpractice occurred before calling.
You do not need every medical record.
And you do not need to have the medical terminology figured out.
Start with what you know.
Morrin Law Office can discuss the circumstances, identify what additional information may be useful, and determine whether further investigation is appropriate.
Call Morrin Law Office for a free consultation
859-358-0300
214 W Main St., Richmond, KY 40475
Contact Morrin Law Office online
Sources and Public Resources
- KRS 422.317 — Copy of Patient’s Medical Record: Kentucky Legislature — KRS 422.317
- KRS 422.355 — Parent/Personal Representative Access to a Minor’s Medical Record: Kentucky Legislature — KRS 422.355
- KRS 413.140 — Current Kentucky Limitations Statute for Covered Medical-Malpractice Actions: Kentucky Legislature — current KRS 413.140
- KRS 413.170 — Infancy and Other Disability Tolling: Kentucky Legislature — KRS 413.170
- KRS 411.130 — Kentucky Wrongful Death Statute: Kentucky Legislature — KRS 411.130
- KRS 411.167 — Certificate of Merit for Medical Malpractice Actions: Kentucky Legislature — KRS 411.167
- KRS 49.070 — State Institutions and Board of Claims Jurisdiction: Kentucky Legislature — KRS 49.070
- KRS 49.120 — Board of Claims Filing Deadlines: Kentucky Legislature — KRS 49.120
- Kentucky Supreme Court Order 2024-19 — KRE 702 Expert-Testimony Amendment: Kentucky Court of Justice — Supreme Court Order 2024-19
Disclaimer
This page provides general public information about requesting a Kentucky birth injury case review. It is not medical advice and is not a substitute for care or advice from qualified healthcare professionals.
It is also not individualized legal advice. Reading this page, submitting a contact form, or making an initial inquiry does not by itself create an attorney-client relationship.
Kentucky laws, court rules, medical standards, filing requirements, and deadlines can change. The correct legal analysis depends on the particular injury, claimant, healthcare providers, defendants, dates, and forum involved.
If you have concerns about your child’s current medical condition, contact the appropriate healthcare professionals. If you have questions about a potential legal claim or filing deadline, seek individualized legal advice promptly.
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