Medical Negligence Solicitors

Before taking on a medical negligence case, our solicitors will check that you have a valid claim. We will need to establish that:

1. You were owed a duty of care by the healthcare provider. This duty is usually automatically established when a doctor-patient relationship exists.
2. The clinician breached their duty of care. This typically involves demonstrating that their actions or omissions fell below the standard of care expected from a reasonable and competent healthcare professional. Sometimes, this is obvious, for example, if an instrument is left inside you after surgery, but more often it requires extensive medical evidence.
3. The medical professional’s negligence directly caused your injury or worsened your condition. This is known as ‘causation.’ For example, imagine if a patient visits their GP several times with signs of cancer but the GP doesn’t refer them for tests. The GP’s actions may be negligent, but proving causation is more complex. It requires expert evidence to show that if the referral had been made earlier, treatment could have started sooner and that would have led to a better outcome.
4. You suffered actual harm, injury, or financial loss due to the negligence. This can include physical injury, emotional distress, medical expenses, loss of income, or other damages.
5. The incident happened within the past three years or you became aware of the negligence no more than three years ago. There are a few exceptions to this rule but, generally, claims made after three years are considered time-barred and will not be accepted by the court.

• Medical misdiagnosis – where a condition gets missed and goes undiagnosed or when a diagnosis is wrong, including misdiagnosis of cancer .
• Mistakes during surgery – include incidents where the wrong operation was performed, infections caused by poor hygiene and cosmetic surgery that has led to disfigurement or scarring.
• Prescription errors – you have been prescribed the wrong medication, incorrect dosage or together with another drug that shouldn’t be taken together.
• Negligent clinical advice – failure to warn of risks, including making alternative treatments clear so that you could make an informed decision.
• Pregnancy and birth injuries – sustained by the mother or baby during pregnancy, labour or after birth.

Various medical professionals can be liable for negligence if they fail to meet the expected standard of care, causing harm to a patient. These professionals can include:

• General practitioners (GPs ), specialists, surgeons, and hospital doctors can all be held accountable for medical negligence.
• Nurses, nurse practitioners, and other nursing staff members may be liable if they breach their duty of care to a patient.
• Dentists and orthodontists can be liable for negligence if they provide substandard care or make mistakes during dental procedures .
• Pharmacists who dispense medication incorrectly or provide incorrect information about medications.
• Midwives can be sued for negligence if they fail to provide appropriate care before, during, or after childbirth, leading to harm to the mother or baby.
• Anesthesiologists who administer anaesthesia incorrectly or fail to monitor a patient’s vital signs during surgery.
• Radiologists who misinterpret medical imaging, such as X-rays or MRIs, and provide inaccurate diagnoses
• Ophthalmologists (eye care professionals) if they provide incorrect prescriptions, misdiagnose eye conditions, or perform eye surgery incorrectly.

To establish a claim, it must be proven that the medical professional breached their duty of care and this breach directly resulted in harm or injury to the patient.

Medical negligence claims are subject to strict time limits, which, if missed, means you could lose the opportunity to pursue your case forever. This time limit is known as the limitation period.

We recommend against judging the calculation of your limitation period without expert advice from a specialist solicitor.

The law governing the medical negligence limitation period is set out in The Limitation Act 1980. In short, you must issue a Claim Form at Court within three years of the date of negligence or the date you first knew about the negligence, whichever is later.

Calculating the limitation period is fraught with complications, so it is important to take legal advice as soon as possible to bring a claim. There are particularly complex rules for assessing the “date of knowledge” of the negligence.

The three years can slip by quickly, and delay increases the risk of losing vital evidence. Therefore, we recommend consulting a solicitor, ideally no later than 12-18 months after the incident of negligence, to avoid the problems caused by delay and to give your claim the best chance of success.

• Suppose someone has died due to medical negligence. In that case, the limitation period is calculated to expire three years from the injured person’s death date or the date of the Personal Representative’s knowledge, whichever is the latter.
• The limitation period for any claim brought by a child (defined as those under the age of 18) does not begin to run until the date of their 18th birthday, which effectively means that they have until their 21st birthday to issue court proceedings.
• Where the person bringing the claim lacks mental capacity, there is no time limit for issuing court proceedings. Assessing capacity is not always straightforward, and solicitors must tread carefully when determining whether their client lacks the capacity to make their own decisions.
• The Court has the power to exercise its discretion to allow court proceedings to be issued outside of the limitation period, but this is reserved for exceptional cases, and there are very specific criteria set by the courts to trigger the Court’s discretion to allow a claim to proceed out of time.

It is very difficult to say exactly how long a medical negligence claim will take from start to finish. It depends on the nature of your case, the complexity of your case, and how long it takes to obtain all the evidence (medical records, witness statements, medical reports, etc).

It also depends on the stance the Defendant takes. The NHS Trusts will usually report to the NHSLA, the governing body of the NHS Trusts.  A lot will depend on the attitude of the NHSLA and/or the Trust.

If legal proceedings are needed, they must be issued at Court no later than 3 years after the date of your injury or 3 years from the date that you knew that the treatment/care you received was negligent. This may happen at a later date, i.e. when you are seen by another specialist, who then diagnoses your injury, explains the cause of the injury to you and explains that it was related to previous medical care that you received.

We can provide advice on any tertiary advice and assistance that you may require during the life of your claim. If the Defendant admits liability for your injury, we can apply for an interim payment of damages on your behalf to assist in speeding up the litigation process.

• Medical negligence compensation can be claimed in the following forms.
  

  General Damages

  The amount of general damages will depend on the severity of your injury, its effect on you, and how long it takes you to recover. We will need you to be seen by an independent medical expert so that we can obtain a medical report on your injury and its effects.

  We need a medical report on the full effects of your injuries to enable us to calculate the value of your claim. If we have a medical report, our assessment of the value of your claim will be more accurate than if we do not

  Special Damages

  The amount of special damages will depend on the expenses that you have incurred as a consequence of your injury such as travel expenses, prescription charges, the value of care provided to you by relatives/friends, any medical fees, loss of earnings, and damaged possessions. It is helpful to keep receipts of the expenses you incur, as it will make it easier for us to prove your losses.

  Past and Future losses can be claimed, but interest will only be paid on past losses once proceedings have been issued on your behalf. Interest cannot be claimed on future losses.

  If you were partly to blame for your injury, your compensation may be reduced to reflect your share of the blame. Although this can but rarely happens in medical negligence cases.

  Sometimes if a claim is disputed, the Defendant will offer reduced compensation as a compromise and to entice early settlement. If this happens, we will advise you on whether the reduced sum should be accepted or your case should proceed to court.

  Welfare benefits

  The Defendant is obliged to repay the government any social security benefits you have received as a result of your injury up until the date of the compensation award.

  The Defendant can deduct these from your compensation on a “like-for-like” basis. For example, suppose you have claimed benefits from the state because you could not work because of your injury. In that case, a claim will be made on your behalf for your loss of earnings, and any benefits paid to you by the state will be repaid on your behalf to the government by the Defendant, and you will receive compensation for your loss of earnings.

  Here are some examples of compensation that our clients have received:

  • Spinal Fracture Case Settles for 6-figure Sum
  • 5-figure settlement for infusion leak to mother
  • Perineal Tear case settles for 6-figure sum
  • Six-figure claim allows family to move home
  • Likely settlement of £15-20 million

Your medical negligence claim may be funded by:-

• Conditional Fee Agreements ( No Win No Fee agreements )
• Before the Event Insurance (BTE)

We offer a Conditional Fee Agreement (No Win No Fee Agreement), and we can offer delegated After the Event (ATE) insurance with deferred premium (payable at the end of the case) to protect you against any adverse costs.

We use the Law Society’s approved Conditional Fee Agreement.

Our guarantee

We guarantee that you will not have to pay anything if we are unsuccessful in obtaining compensation for you. If this happens, we are paid nothing.

If your claim is successful, you may have to pay legal fees and expenses out of your compensation, but we guarantee that this will not exceed 25% of the compensation awarded to you and this includes the ATE insurance premium and IPT.

These guarantees only apply if you pursue your claim with us for as long as it has reasonable prospects of success, follow our professional advice and do not deliberately mislead us.

The deduction from damages

There are two elements to the deduction from damages:-

1. A “success fee” to cover us for the risk of losing your case and being paid nothing.
2. A premium for insurance to cover you against the risk of having to pay the other side’s legal fees or your expert fees and expenses.

We guarantee that the deductions will not exceed a maximum of one-quarter of your compensation.

The success fee is a percentage uplift on our normal fees to cover us for the cases we lose. It is not a percentage of your compensation.

The amount of the success fee depends on how risky your case is. The riskier, the higher the percentage uplift on our normal fees.

ATE Insurance cover

The insurance policy is to cover you against two risks:-

1. We will fund the experts’ fees and other expenses. If your claim succeeds, the other side will pay these expenses. If it is unsuccessful, the insurance company pays these fees for you.

2. If you reject a formal offer of settlement and then a Judge awards you the same amount or less, the normal rule is to pay the other side’s costs from the date you should have accepted the offer. However, if we advised you to reject the offer and you took our advice, the insurance will pay the other side’s costs.

Remember that we guarantee that the success fee and the insurance premium combined will not exceed 25% of the compensation awarded to you.

If you have BTE insurance cover that provides cover for you for clinical/medical claims at the time of your injury. In that case, we can write to your insurers to request coverage under such a policy to investigate your potential claim.

It is rare for medical negligence claims to go to court. Most cases are settled once all the investigations are completed before legal proceedings are issued.

Where proceedings are issued, as long as the case has good supporting medical evidence, most cases settle without the need to go to court.

It is in everyone’s interest to avoid court, so both sides are encouraged to settle matters quickly to avoid extra costs.

However, even though most cases settle well before going to trial, you should ultimately be prepared for going to court so a judge, having heard all the evidence, can decide whether the treatment was negligent.

A patient recall letter is sent by a hospital or healthcare provider to people who previously have received treatment from them. The letter explains that there may have been an issue with the treatment received or the actions of an individual medical professional and asks the recipient to come in again to be re-examined.

The first thing is to attend the recall appointment and get checked out. Stay calm. Getting a patient recall letter may be concerning, but it doesn’t necessarily mean that you have been a victim of medical negligence. The hospital or healthcare provider is simply taking precautionary measures to ensure the safety and well-being of their patients.

If you have concerns about the medical treatment or diagnosis you received, speak to our medical negligence team. The patient recall letter serves as a record, acknowledging that the healthcare provider is aware of the potential claim. However, this does not mean that you should accept any offer of settlement from the healthcare provider without consulting with our team first, as it may not be a fair amount for your specific case. Our experienced solicitors can assess your situation and advise you on the best course of action to take.

Our team regularly receives calls from clients who have instructed other law firms, asking, “Can I change my solicitor?”

If you have a claim but are not happy with the advice you are receiving, we have specialist solicitors able to assist.