Kimberly Wallace Goodwin, individually and as the natural parent of Jackson Wallace Goodwin and Jonathon Goodwin, individually and as the parent of Jackson Wallace Goodwin v. Mat-Su Midwifery, Inc., Judi Davidson, and Darcy Lucey, Mat-Su Midwifery, Inc., Judi Davidson, and Darcy Lucey v. Kimberly Wallace Goodwin, Individually and as the Natural Parent of Jackson Wallace Goodwin and Jonathon Goodwin, Individually and as the Parent of Jackson Wallace Goodwin, 562 P.3d 26

Kimberly and Jonathon Goodwin sued Mat-Su Midwifery and two midwives for negligence and lack of informed consent after their son, Jackson, was stillborn at a birth center.
The Goodwins alleged the midwives failed to inform them of the risks associated with midwife delivery, particularly given Kimberly’s advanced maternal age and miscarriage history.
The superior court granted summary judgment to the midwives, ruling that the Goodwins did not provide evidence the midwives’ care caused the stillbirth; the midwives’ expert pointed to an unrelated infection as the cause.
The Goodwins’ experts (first Osbourne, then Cook) did not provide a concrete medical causation opinion linking the midwives' care to the stillbirth.
The superior court also awarded enhanced attorney’s fees to the midwives, citing the plaintiffs’ conduct as vexatious and dilatory over several years of litigation.
On appeal, the pivotal issue was whether Alaska law required proof of medical causation for informed consent claims, and whether the Goodwins met that requirement.

Issue	Plaintiff's Argument	Defendant's Argument	Held
Is medical causation required in informed consent claims?	Only needed to show plaintiffs would have chosen hospital care if properly informed	Plaintiffs must show non-disclosure was a substantial factor in causing the harm	Medical causation is required in Alaska for such claims
Sufficiency of plaintiffs’ evidence on causation	Expert (Cook) sufficiently linked midwives’ actions to stillbirth	Plaintiffs failed to rebut expert evidence that infection caused stillbirth	Plaintiffs failed to offer admissible evidence on causation
Necessity of expert testimony on causation	Lay inference is sufficient based on sequence of events	Medical causation here is outside a layperson’s everyday experience	Expert testimony was required and lacking
Enhanced attorney’s fees	Award was not justified by plaintiffs’ conduct	Conduct was vexatious, unreasonable, and drove up fees	Enhanced award (64.5%) was within the trial court’s discretion

Poulin v. Zartman, 542 P.2d 251 (Alaska 1975) (proximate cause is necessary for lack of informed consent claims)
Parker v. Tomera, 89 P.3d 761 (Alaska 2004) (expert testimony requirements in medical malpractice informed consent claims)
Culliton v. Hope Cmty. Res. Inc., 491 P.3d 1088 (Alaska 2021) (need for expert testimony when lay inference is insufficient)
Greywolf v. Carroll, 151 P.3d 1234 (Alaska 2007) (failure of proof on essential element renders all other facts immaterial)