Gestational Diabetes Misdiagnosis and Malpractice Lawyer

Our lawyers handle gestational diabetes misdiagnosis and treatment lawsuits. A failure to diagnose gestational diabetes can lead to a host of injuries that can have a lasting effect on the child.

We review claims involving gestational diabetes misdiagnosis, failure to diagnose or treat gestational diabetes, fetal macrosomia, shoulder dystocia, brachial plexus injuries, stillbirth, and other birth injuries.  We are based in Maryland but handle these cases nationally. If you believe you have a claim, call us today at 800-553-8082 or get a free online consultation.

What Is Gestational Diabetes?

Gestational diabetes mellitus (GDM) is diabetes that develops or is first diagnosed during pregnancy. In simpler terms, it is diabetes while being pregnant.

This can complicate childbirth. The main concern is the baby’s size. Delivering large children can lead to more difficult labor and delivery, resulting in shoulder dystocia or a brachial plexus injury.

The CDC estimates that 5% to 9% of pregnancies in the United States are affected by gestational diabetes. Some studies using broader diagnostic criteria have found rates approaching 15% to 20%. Think about that. Under those criteria, you are getting close to one in five pregnant women. Doctors should be on the lookout.

Still, misdiagnosis of gestational diabetes is all too common, carrying risks to both mother and fetus. Children born to mothers with GDM may have excessive birth weights, resulting in higher rates of cesarean delivery and difficult vaginal delivery, which carries the risk of trauma to both mother and child. Babies also have a risk of hypoglycemia (low blood sugar) and hyperinsulinemia (high blood insulin). They are also at risk for glucose intolerance and long-term obesity.

Following pregnancy, women who have gestational diabetes have an estimated 50 to 60% lifetime risk of developing diabetes. Women with a history of GDM also have about a tenfold increased risk of developing type 2 diabetes compared with women who did not have gestational diabetes.

Current guidelines recommend testing women with recent GDM for diabetes or prediabetes 4 to 12 weeks after delivery and continuing screening every 1 to 3 years after that.

Can Gestational Diabetes Be Misdiagnosed?

Yes. Gestational diabetes can be misdiagnosed. But in the malpractice cases our lawyers see, the bigger concern is usually a missed diagnosis or a failure to properly act on abnormal glucose testing.

A woman may have no obvious symptoms. So doctors cannot reliably determine who has gestational diabetes just by looking at the patient or deciding she does not fit the usual risk profile.

A gestational diabetes negligence claim may involve failing to order appropriate screening, failing to follow up on an abnormal glucose challenge test, misreading test results, failing to communicate a diagnosis, or diagnosing GDM but failing to properly monitor and treat it.

But a missed diagnosis alone does not make a malpractice case. A lawyer handling a failure to diagnose gestational diabetes claim still has to show that the mistake caused an injury to the mother or child.

Gestational Diabetes Guidelines and Testing

Gestational diabetes is usually screened for between 24 and 28 weeks of pregnancy in women who have not already been diagnosed with diabetes or identified as having high-risk abnormal glucose levels earlier in pregnancy.

There are two commonly used approaches.

Under the one-step approach, the patient receives a fasting 75-gram oral glucose tolerance test (OGTT). Gestational diabetes is diagnosed if one or more of these glucose levels are met or exceeded:

• Fasting: 92 mg/dL
• 1 hour: 180 mg/dL
• 2 hours: 153 mg/dL

The two-step approach begins with a 50-gram glucose challenge test. If the one-hour result meets the screening threshold used by the practice, usually 130, 135, or 140 mg/dL, the patient undergoes a fasting 100-gram oral glucose tolerance test.

Current American Diabetes Association guidance recognizes both approaches. ACOG continues to support the two-step approach commonly used in the United States.

This is important because a fasting glucose level of 92 mg/dL is not a universal stand-alone cutoff for every type of gestational diabetes testing. The test result has to be considered in the context of the screening method that was used.

Testing earlier in pregnancy may be appropriate for women with risk factors for undiagnosed diabetes or abnormal glucose metabolism. Women who are not diagnosed earlier are generally screened again at 24 to 28 weeks.

Although there are additional costs associated with glucose testing, due to the risk of missed diagnoses of GDM, doctors should not select who undergoes routine screening simply by deciding who looks like she is likely to have gestational diabetes.

• Value of birth injury cases
• Do dim lights before bed reduce the risk of gestational diabetes?

Who Is at Risk for Gestational Diabetes?

Any woman can get gestational diabetes, including those who look very different from what you picture in your mind. Doctors should not stereotype who may have it based on anything other than proper assessment, evaluation, and testing.

That said, women of African, Asian, Hispanic, Native American, and Pacific Islander descent are among the groups at increased risk.

Other risk factors include age, obesity, a prior pregnancy with gestational diabetes, previously delivering a large baby, family history of type 2 diabetes, use of corticosteroids, and polycystic ovary syndrome.

Is It Medical Malpractice Not to Get a C-Section If You Have Gestational Diabetes?

The risk of a difficult delivery with a large baby leads many obstetricians to consider whether a woman with gestational diabetes should have a C-section instead of vaginal birth.

But having gestational diabetes does not automatically mean a woman should have a C-section.

Current ACOG guidance recommends counseling women with gestational diabetes about the risks and benefits of a scheduled cesarean delivery when the estimated fetal weight is 4,500 grams or more, just under 10 pounds.

The allegation that the OB should have performed a C-section is at the core of many birth injury lawsuits. Whether the failure to perform a C-section is medical malpractice depends on the unique facts of a given lawsuit.

Those facts can include the estimated fetal weight, the mother’s glucose control, prior delivery history, prior shoulder dystocia, fetal growth, labor progress, and what the doctor knew before and during delivery.

There is another wrinkle. Estimated fetal weight is an estimate. Ultrasound is not a bathroom scale. That uncertainty often becomes part of the defense in a gestational diabetes malpractice lawsuit.

Treating Gestational Diabetes

Doctors must monitor a woman with gestational diabetes to ensure the child is growing at the appropriate rate and that the woman’s glucose levels are under control.

Gestational diabetes can usually be controlled by making dietary and lifestyle changes. But some women with gestational diabetes cannot achieve glucose target levels without pharmacotherapy.

So insulin shots are sometimes necessary to keep diabetes under control so that it does not interfere with the pregnancy.

Gestational Diabetes Medical Literature

In gestational diabetes malpractice cases, there is a body of medical literature frequently relied upon by experts. Here is some of that literature:

• 2025: Veillon Jr., E. W., et al. CGM in Early Gestational Diabetes Improves Maternal Glycemic Control and Neonatal Outcomes. Diabetes, 74(Supplement 1):180-OR. In a randomized controlled trial conducted from October 2021 to December 2023, 120 women with GDM diagnosed between 8 and 26 weeks’ gestation were randomized to real-time CGM or standard self-monitoring of blood glucose. Both groups received lifestyle and medication guidance based on glucose readings until delivery. Results showed that the CGM group had fewer unscheduled cesarean sections and preterm deliveries, and their infants had lower rates of large-for-gestational-age births and NICU admissions. This was presented as a conference abstract.
• 2023: Simmons, D., et al.; TOBOGM Research Group. Treatment of Gestational Diabetes Mellitus Diagnosed Early in Pregnancy. New England Journal of Medicine, 388(23), 2132-2144. This study aimed to determine the benefits of treating gestational diabetes diagnosed before 20 weeks’ gestation on maternal and infant health. Eight hundred two women, between four and 19 weeks six days’ gestation, were diagnosed with gestational diabetes. They were split into two groups: immediate treatment and deferred/no treatment. The results showed that immediate treatment before 20 weeks produced a modest reduction in adverse neonatal outcomes.
• 2020: Artzi, N., et al. Prediction of gestational diabetes based on nationwide electronic health records. Nature Medicine 2020; 26(1):71-76. This Israeli study evaluated whether gestational diabetes could be predicted early using electronic health record data.
• 2019: Scholtens, D., et al. Hyperglycemia and Adverse Pregnancy Outcome Follow-up Study (HAPO FUS): Maternal Glycemia and Childhood Glucose Metabolism. Diabetes Care 2019 Mar; 42(3):381-392. On the maternal glucose spectrum, exposure to higher levels in utero is linked with childhood glucose and insulin resistance, regardless of maternal and childhood BMI and family history of diabetes.
• 2018: Lowe, W., et al. Association of gestational diabetes with maternal disorders of glucose metabolism and childhood adiposity. JAMA 320, 1005-1016.

How to Calculate a Gestational Diabetes Settlement Amount

Determining a settlement amount for a gestational diabetes birth injury lawsuit, like any personal injury or medical malpractice lawsuit, requires a multifaceted analysis. A gestational diabetes settlement amount in a birth injury lawsuit will depend on the case’s specifics, the injuries’ severity, the strength of the evidence, and numerous other factors. We give you settlement amounts and jury payouts below. But they cannot tell you the value of your case.

But here are the key factors to determine appropriate settlement compensation:

• Strength of the Case: A gestational diabetes birth injury case is almost sure to be a serious claim. So everything begins with the question of whether you can win the case. The strength of evidence linking the medical professional’s negligence to the birth injury plays a vital role. Do you have strong experts who can show negligence and that the negligence caused the injury? That is the key.
• Nature and Extent of the Injury: The more severe and permanent the injury, the higher the potential settlement. It’s essential to understand the nature of the injury, its long-term implications, and whether the child will need lifelong care.
• Medical Expenses and Other Economic Costs: Pain and suffering drive the value of any case like this. But juries use the economic damages as a benchmark for pain and suffering. And the economic damages in a birth injury lawsuit can quickly get into the tens of millions of dollars over a lifetime. So your lawyer needs to put the right experts in place – doctors, life care planners, and economists – to weigh in on crucial damage elements like future care costs and lost earning potential.
• Pain and Suffering: This non-economic damage is more subjective and can vary significantly from one case to the next. It’s compensation for the physical and emotional pain and suffering from the injury.
• Jurisdiction: Some states have more favorable laws for birth injury claims than others. And how juries view how much damages to award – and how much they think doctors can do no wrong – varies from county to county and city to city.
• Your Lawyer: The best birth injury lawyers get the best settlement amounts and jury awards. Picking the right lawyer is the most significant decision you will make.

Gestational Diabetes Settlements and Verdicts

There are two types of gestational diabetes malpractice cases:

• Failing to realize the woman has gestational diabetes
• Failing to properly treat the patient who has it

Below are gestational diabetes stories of complications and how the legal system handled the case, either by settlement or verdict. We are trying to keep this list focused on cases where diabetes testing, maternal diabetes, fetal size, or the resulting delivery risk was actually part of the malpractice claim.

• 2024, Illinois: A mother was admitted to a Chicago-area academic medical center at 38 weeks for a scheduled induction because of gestational diabetes. This was not her first C-section, but she later had a successful vaginal birth, so another vaginal birth after cesarean was attempted. Pitocin was administered, and the fetal heart tracing went from Category I to Category II with tachycardia and recurrent variable decelerations. The plaintiffs alleged that the medical team failed to stop the Pitocin, perform appropriate intrauterine resuscitation, or deliver the baby when the tracing continued to deteriorate. The tracing eventually progressed to Category III. The baby was born profoundly depressed with cord gases consistent with acute asphyxia and suffered severe permanent neurological injuries requiring lifelong care. The case settled for $23 million.
• 2024, Virginia: A pregnant woman was considered at moderate to high risk for gestational diabetes and preeclampsia because of her weight and other medical conditions. During prenatal care, urine testing repeatedly showed elevated glucose and protein, but the plaintiff alleged those warning signs were not adequately investigated. Near the end of the pregnancy, fetal monitoring deteriorated, and a biophysical profile showed significant polyhydramnios. The baby was later delivered by emergency C-section but did not survive. The autopsy showed an 11.6-pound macrosomic baby who died from an acute hypoxic-ischemic event. The mother alleged that the medical team failed to recognize and treat gestational diabetes and other pregnancy complications and then failed to respond appropriately when the fetal heart tracing became ominous. The case settled for $1 million.
• 2023, Louisiana: A first-time mother with gestational diabetes was at increased risk of having a large baby. At 39 weeks, she attempted a vaginal delivery. Her obstetrician encountered shoulder dystocia after the baby’s shoulder became impacted behind the pubic bone. The baby weighed more than nine pounds. The plaintiffs alleged that ultrasound evidence suggested macrosomia, that the obstetrician failed to adequately recognize the baby’s size before delivery, and that excessive lateral traction was used instead of properly resolving the shoulder dystocia. The child suffered a permanent brachial plexus injury that left him with significant loss of function in his left arm and shoulder despite surgery and therapy. The jury awarded approximately $15.96 million, including $15.75 million in noneconomic damages. Louisiana’s medical malpractice limits substantially reduced the final judgment.
• 2018, New Mexico: A 36-year-old diabetic mother gave birth to an 11.5-pound child. During the vaginal delivery, the obstetrician encountered shoulder dystocia and used a vacuum-extraction device. The child was deprived of oxygen for approximately 10 minutes and suffered brain damage and a severe brachial plexus injury. The mother also suffered serious vaginal and rectal injuries. The plaintiffs alleged that because the mother had diabetes, the obstetrician should have appreciated the increased risk of a very large baby and obtained additional ultrasounds to determine fetal size. Their experts testified that a C-section should have been performed. A jury awarded the plaintiffs $73.1 million.
• 2017, Illinois: A baby was stillborn after the mother received prenatal care. The lawsuit alleged that the OB/GYN failed to adequately and completely test the mother for gestational diabetes, failed to notice signs and symptoms of gestational diabetes, and failed to properly perform gestational diabetes screening. The federal case settled for $500,000.

These are sample settlements and verdicts that were favorable to plaintiffs. These are the winners. We stepped over some defense verdicts in putting this list together.

These verdicts should be a tool for understanding the value of these cases. But you cannot use these results to predict any individual case’s settlement or trial value. It would be easier if we could just grab a prior result and say the case is a sure winner and worth X. But the real world is much more complicated.

Getting a Lawyer for Your Gestational Diabetes Birth Injury Lawsuit

Gestational diabetes is a challenge to pregnancy. But with good care and treatment, it can usually be managed so that mother and child emerge unharmed.

If you believe you had gestational diabetes but were not correctly diagnosed and treated, and there is an injury to you or your baby, you may have a medical malpractice case for which you and your child could receive compensation.

Our gestational diabetes lawyers review claims involving gestational diabetes misdiagnosis, failure to diagnose or treat gestational diabetes, fetal macrosomia, shoulder dystocia, brachial plexus injuries, stillbirth, and other birth injuries. If you believe this was the case with you, call 800-553-8082 or get a free online consultation.