Teresa Fariss McClain and Elizabeth M. Fors, Robins Kaplan LLP

The United States has the highest infant and maternal mortality rates out of any other high-income country and it keeps increasing, according to a report by the Commonwealth Fund. That’s one reason why Teresa Fariss McClain of Robins Kaplan LLP is dedicated to representing mothers and babies who receive negligent medical care. A former labor and delivery nurse, she derives satisfaction from helping the families.

Recently Fariss McClain and co-counsel Elizabeth Fors tried such a case where alleged negligence took the life of a mother and caused a baby to suffer a brain injury. The mother repeatedly sought care for what turned out to be a ruptured membrane, leading to a bacterial infection. She was sent home but returned to seek further medical care.

The mother died before delivering the baby, and the child ended up in a wheelchair. No autopsy was performed.

To Fariss McClain it illustrates that women’s health is not taken seriously. “Hopefully, the jury will take the dad seriously,” Fariss McClain said. The case had not gone to the jury at Minnesota Lawyer’s deadline. After mock trials, the juries had awarded plaintiffs substantial numbers, Fariss McClain said.

Fors agrees that women’s maternal health issues are not always taken seriously, including those of black women. She has three trials scheduled in the coming months, and sees them as holdovers from the COVID-19 pandemic shutdown of the courts. The wait has been difficult for clients, she said.

The survivorship law passed in 2023 that provides that damages for pain and suffering can survive the death of an injured person may mean changes for medical malpractice practitioners, (Minn. Stat. sec. 573.01) Fors said. The effect of change like that in the law takes time to work out, she said.

More medical malpractice cases are going to trial, Fariss McClain said. She attributes the change to a growth in insurance companies’ risk tolerance and new insurance companies moving into the market who are willing to go to trial.