Liability for Miscarriage Suffered Following a Crash

I’m David Holub, an attorney focusing on personal injury law in northwest Indiana.

Welcome to Personal Injury Primer, where we break down the law into simple terms, provide legal tips, and discuss personal injury law topics.

Today’s question comes from a caller who was pregnant when she was injured in a car crash. Shortly after the crash, she had a miscarriage.

She wanted to know if the driver who was negligent and caused the crash could be made to pay for the loss of the unborn child she was carrying at the time of the crash.

The short answer is that in Indiana if the unborn child was viable before the crash, the caller might be able to successfully recover for the loss of the child if a medical doctor were able to say that the crash was “more likely than not a contributing cause” of the miscarriage.

To make that judgment call a physician will want to take into account such factors as the age, height, and weight of the woman at the time of the miscarriage. The physician will also want to know if the woman had a pre-crash history of successfully delivering a child, other miscarriages, or other health challenges during pregnancy.

In the caller’s case, she had successfully delivered a child 2 years before the accident. But, 10 months before the crash she had a miscarriage.

The caller saw her Obgyn about two weeks before the crash, and all was well at this time.

Following the crash, she was taken to the hospital by an ambulance where she was noted to have complaints of abdominal pain (mostly where the seatbelt was fastened) as well as head pain, left flank pain, and back pain.

An ultrasound was performed to check the fetus and it confirmed a normal fetal heartbeat, and the woman was discharged. Her blood pressure was very high however during her check at the emergency room. Though, by the time she left the hospital her blood pressure had returned to normal.

Nevertheless, despite the strong impact between the two vehicles involved in the crash and lots of bruising and aches and pains, the hospital saw no reason to keep the woman overnight once her blood pressure normalized.

However, two days following the crash, the woman again went to the hospital, this time with complaints of intense lower pelvic cramping, vaginal bleeding, nausea, and vomiting. Her blood pressure was again quite elevated. An ultrasound showed no fetal heartbeat.

Given the woman’s circumstances and medical history before and after the crash, we advised the woman that her chances of recovering damages for the loss of the child would be good, depending on whether her doctor was willing to say that the crash contributed to causing her miscarriage.

I hope you found this information helpful. If you are a victim of someone’s carelessness, substandard medical care, product defect, work injury, or another personal injury, please call (219) 736-9700 with your questions. You can also learn more about us by visiting our website at DavidHolubLaw.com – while there, make sure you request a copy of our book “Fighting for Truth.”