If you’ve been living with the effects of a difficult birth, you probably don’t need a report to tell you it’s been expensive.
Maybe it’s the physio appointments for a pelvic floor that still isn’t right. The psychologist you’ve been seeing since. The months you couldn’t go back to work, or the job you left because sitting through a full day was too painful. The childcare you paid for because you simply couldn’t manage on your own. The appointments you had to fit around a newborn, the petrol, the parking, the pharmacy bills.
These costs are real. They’re often invisible to everyone except you. And for the first time, someone has added them up.
A world-first look at the true cost
During Birth Trauma Awareness Week in July 2026, Birth Trauma Australia released a report prepared by Nous Group that put a number on something many women have felt privately for years. Birth injury and birth trauma carry an estimated $17.5 billion economic burden in Australia.
That figure takes in direct healthcare costs, time lost from work, household expenses and the broader impact on wellbeing. The theme of this year’s awareness week said it plainly: the cost of birth trauma.
Birth Trauma Australia also made an important point: the effects of birth trauma don’t stop with the person who gave birth. They reach partners, children, families and communities, and they can last for years. Sometimes for life.
It’s a striking number. But behind it are individual women and families, each carrying their own share, usually quietly.
Why this report matters
For a long time, birth trauma has been talked about, when it’s talked about at all, as a private emotional experience. Something to “get over.” Something that happens behind closed doors and is best not mentioned at the school gate.
Putting a dollar figure on it changes the conversation. It says that birth trauma isn’t only personal. It’s a health issue, a workforce issue and an economic issue. It affects whether women return to work, how families manage financially, and how much support they need from the health system in the years that follow.
That matters for policy. But it also matters for you. Because if the costs of birth trauma are this significant across the country, it’s worth asking a simple question about your own situation: who is paying for yours?
Most of that cost lands on families
Here’s what we see again and again. When a birth injury happens, the cost doesn’t disappear. It moves. Usually onto the mother and her family.
It shows up as:
- Medical and allied health treatment, sometimes for years. Specialist reviews, pelvic health physiotherapy, surgery, medication, continence products.
- Psychological care, for birth-related anxiety, depression or post-traumatic stress, and sometimes for your partner too.
- Lost income, whether that’s extended leave, reduced hours, a career put on hold, or a return to work that never quite happened.
- Help at home, from family who step in, or paid help for cleaning, childcare and the heavy lifting you can’t do while you recover.
- The things that are harder to price: the strain on relationships, the loss of confidence, the difficulty of enjoying early months with your baby.
Many women absorb all of this, assuming it’s simply the price of having a baby. They pay out of pocket, put the gap on a credit card, or go without the care they need because it’s too expensive.
And when an injury was genuinely unavoidable, there may be no one else to share that load. That’s a hard truth, and one that the broader push for better postnatal support is trying to address.
But when an injury happened because something in your care went wrong, the law says those costs shouldn’t be yours alone to carry.
When the cost isn’t yours to carry
Not every difficult birth involves negligence. Complications happen, even when everyone does everything right. We say this to every woman we speak with, because it’s true.
But some injuries happen because of a mistake. Some of the situations we see include:
- A serious perineal tear that wasn’t properly identified or repaired
- A postpartum haemorrhage that wasn’t recognised or managed quickly enough
- A delayed decision to move to an emergency caesarean
- Forceps or vacuum used when they shouldn’t have been, or used incorrectly
- A high-risk pregnancy that wasn’t monitored as it should have been
- A risk that was never explained to you, so you couldn’t make an informed choice
“Negligence” is a legal word, but the idea behind it is simple. Doctors, midwives and hospitals are expected to provide a reasonable standard of care. If they fell short of that standard, and that caused you harm, you may have the right to claim compensation.
What compensation is actually for
Compensation isn’t about punishment, and it isn’t a windfall. It’s about practical recovery. In broad terms, a claim can seek to cover:
- Past and future medical and treatment expenses, including physiotherapy, surgery and psychological care
- Past and future loss of earnings, if your injury affected your ability to work
- Care and assistance, including help you’ve received from family or paid providers
- Pain and suffering, sometimes called “non-economic loss,” which recognises the physical and emotional impact of the injury on your life
Every case is different, and what you may be entitled to depends on your circumstances and the evidence. We can’t tell you what your claim might be worth without looking at your situation carefully, and we’d be wary of anyone who says otherwise.
What we can say is this: when you look at the costs listed in the Birth Trauma Australia report, many of them are exactly the kinds of losses a compensation claim is designed to address.
Partners carry a share too
The report’s focus on families is important. Partners often witness frightening moments during birth: an emergency, a haemorrhage, a baby taken away for urgent care. Some go on to experience serious psychological harm.
In some circumstances, family members who suffer a recognised psychological injury after witnessing a traumatic birth caused by negligence may also have legal rights. It’s a lesser-known area of the law, and it’s worth asking about if it applies to your family.
“I wasn’t sure it was bad enough”
A lot of women we speak to say this. The NSW Parliamentary Inquiry into Birth Trauma heard from thousands of women and found that around 28% of women experience birth trauma. Most of them never ask whether they have legal rights.
Some feel that complaining would be ungrateful when their baby is healthy. Some don’t want to criticise the midwives who were kind to them. Some were told their symptoms were normal and believed it.
All of those feelings are understandable. None of them mean you shouldn’t ask questions. Asking whether your care met the standard it should have is not an attack on the people who looked after you. It’s simply your right.
If you’re asking the question, it’s worth having a conversation. There’s no obligation, and talking to us doesn’t commit you to anything.
What you can do now
Even if you’re not ready to talk to a lawyer, there are simple things you can do to look after your own interests:
- Keep a record of your costs. Receipts, invoices, Medicare statements and time off work.
- Write down what you remember about your birth while it’s still fresh: who said what, what you were told, and when.
- Keep your appointments and tell your treating doctors about all your symptoms, even the embarrassing ones.
- Ask for your records. You’re entitled to request your medical records from the hospital.
These steps help you get the right care, and they help if you later decide to explore a claim.
What to expect if you reach out
We’ll be honest with you. Medical negligence claims can be challenging and take time. They involve reviewing medical records, obtaining independent expert opinions and careful preparation. It can be emotionally demanding to revisit what happened.
What we can offer is clarity and support along the way. Our firm is led by Anthony Porthouse, an Accredited Specialist in Personal Injury Law with 36 years’ experience in medical negligence, listed in Doyle’s Guide as a leading medical negligence lawyer in NSW.
We work on a no win, no fee basis. And we do something most firms don’t: before we begin, we agree a clear, fixed fee for each stage of your case. No vague estimate at the start and shock at the end. No surprises.
You deserve answers
The $17.5 billion figure tells us birth trauma is a national problem, one that’s finally getting the attention it deserves. But your experience isn’t a statistic.
If your birth has left you carrying costs you didn’t expect, whether physical, emotional or financial, you’re entitled to ask whether it should have happened. And you’re entitled to a straight answer.
Talk to us confidentially — free initial consultation
This information is general in nature and does not constitute legal advice. Every case is unique. We encourage you to contact us directly to discuss your specific circumstances.
