Infant Injuries Caused By BK Docs Who Ignored Pregnant Mom: Suit

FORT GREENE, BROOKLYN — Brooklyn doctors stand accused of giving a pregnant woman shoddy care, ignoring her pleas for help when complications ensued, and causing debilitating health issues her baby will live with for the rest of his life, a new lawsuit claims.

The mother, who asked to remain anonymous, filed suit in Brooklyn Federal Court on Nov. 7 against the Brooklyn Hospital Center and Brooklyn Plaza Medical Center doctors she says mistreated her pregnancy complications in late 2015, records show.

"Her child is going to have a lifetime of catastrophic pain and suffering," said attorney John Bonina. "Just caring for her child is going to be a huge undertaking for her physically and emotionally as well."

The small baby lived in hospitals for most of his first year as doctors treated a brain bleed, chronic lung disease and other medical problems, Bonina said. He still suffers developmental delays, brain damage and a host of other issues, he added.

Bonina said he believes the child's life was saved by another hospital that offered the mother care and delivered her child, "but by then the damage had been done."

The suit specifically names Brooklyn Plaza Medical Center's Dr. Frederick Staton and Brooklyn Hospital Center's Dr. Michael Cabbad, who both cared for the mother at different times in her pregnancy. It lays out 16 claims against the doctors.

The mother was hospitalized at Brooklyn Hospital Center for two weeks where doctors helped with her risk of preterm labor, Bonina said.

But when she returned for an appointment with Staton a week later with concerns, he sent her home with assurances that everything was normal. She was also sent away from the Brooklyn Hospital Center emergency room twice by doctors there who said nothing was wrong, Bonina said.

The doctors eventually stopped answering the mother's calls, Bonina said, and she decided she would go to another hospital for help.

"Then she realizes she is not comfortable with the advice she is getting," Bonina said. "Had she not done that the overwhelming likelihood is the child would not have been born alive."

The mother would later discover her placenta had begun to separate from the uterus, depriving her baby of oxygen and nutrients, Bonina said.

She went to Northwell Health, where her baby was ultimately delivered.

Her doctors' negligence and malpractice directly led to the infant's medical problems, the lawsuit alleges, and the "monumental" medical bills the mother will have to pay for his care.

As is typical with these cases, the lawsuit doesn't specify how much the woman believes she is owed because of the malpractice, Bonina said. But he added that caring for her child's medical needs will likely cost the mother six figures each year.

"For those reasons, knowing that proper care could have prevented much of what happened to her child, she is seeking to hold Brooklyn Hospital accountable," he said.

Neither Brooklyn Hospital Center nor Dr. Staton at Brooklyn Plaza Medical Center replied immediately to Patch's requests for comment.