Mother takes action against hospital over son’s birth

A FIVE-YEAR-OLD boy who is seriously mentally and physically disabled due to alleged negligence during his birth at the National Maternity Hospital has begun an action for damages in the High Court.

When Michelle Gilroy was in labour at the hospital at Holles Street, Dublin, she was never told that her son Paul Fitzpatrick was in foetal distress.

Nor was she told that a cutting procedure aimed at facilitating easier delivery — known as an episotomy — which she was offered but declined, was required to deliver him, her counsel Aongus Ó Brolchain SC said.