INTRODUCTORY COMMENT
A leading claim against the perinatologist involves allegations of improper management
of neonatal infection. Since the morbidity of infection includes brain damage and
destruction of joints and organs, the attending physicians must expect that treatment
records will be scrutinized by the patient's representatives when untoward events
occur. Because of statutes of limitations designed to protect infants, these claims
can sometimes be raised for the first time 10 or 20 years or more after the events
in question. For this reason the medical chart must be attended to as meticulously
as the patient in order to demonstrate and memorialize the propriety of the treatment
rendered.
Steven E. North
