Injured Children

Overview

When a child is harmed by medical negligence, the consequences can last a lifetime — affecting not just the child, but the entire family. These cases demand an attorney who combines fierce advocacy with genuine medical knowledge: someone who can read fetal monitoring strips, understand the physiology of a difficult delivery, recognize when pediatric care fell below the standard, and then translate those findings into a compelling legal case.

Dr. Stephen A. Barnes, MD, JD, FACLM is that attorney. A board-certified surgeon who has cared for pediatric patients throughout his career — including charitable surgical missions in Guatemala and El Salvador where he performed cleft lip and palate repairs and pediatric hernia corrections as the sole physician in attendance — Dr. Barnes understands children’s medicine from direct clinical experience. Combined with his legal training at Harvard Law School and his years as a trial attorney, this makes Barnes & Associates uniquely positioned to represent injured children and their families.

Cases involving birth injuries and pediatric malpractice are among the most emotionally and legally complex matters in medicine and law. They require expert understanding of obstetrics, neonatology, pediatric neurology, and developmental medicine, as well as the legal framework governing medical negligence claims in Texas. Dr. Barnes handles all of it in-house, without needing to farm out the medical analysis to outside consultants.

What We Handle

• Birth injuries, including hypoxic-ischemic encephalopathy (HIE) and anoxic brain damage from oxygen deprivation during labor and delivery
• Erb’s palsy and brachial plexus injuries caused by excessive traction during delivery
• Fetal monitoring failures and delayed emergency cesarean section
• Neonatal infections and failure to timely diagnose and treat newborn sepsis
• Pediatric misdiagnosis and delayed diagnosis
• Surgical errors in pediatric patients
• Medication errors and pharmacy negligence affecting children
• Wrongful death of a newborn, infant, or child due to medical negligence

Why Choose a Physician-Attorney?

Birth injury and pediatric malpractice cases hinge on highly technical medical questions: Was the fetal heart rate tracing abnormal, and if so, when should the team have acted? Was the delivery technique within the standard of care? Was the newborn’s deterioration recognized and managed appropriately? These are questions that require a physician to answer — not just a lawyer who has hired a physician to consult.

Dr. Barnes evaluates these questions himself, bringing the same clinical judgment he applied in his surgical practice to the analysis of pediatric injury cases. This means faster, more accurate case evaluation, more credible expert analysis, and litigation strategy informed by a physician who has stood in a delivery room, an operating suite, and a courtroom. Families navigating the aftermath of a child’s injury deserve that level of commitment and expertise.