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NHS ‘accused vaginal mesh victim of lying about pain and subjected her to surveillance’


The NHS accused vaginal mesh victims fighting for compensation of lying about pain, it has been claimed.

Women suing hospitals over harm they suffered following mesh operations are being subjected to “devastating” treatment, according to Robert Rose, the head of clinical negligence at law firm Lime Solicitors.

Campaign group Sling the Mesh, which represents thousands of patients, said it had received reports of those injured claiming they have been told their symptoms are psychosomatic, that their evidence is not convincing because of their mental state, or that they are lying about their pain.

It comes as MPs are set to hold an inquiry following up on the Independent Medicines and Medical Devices (IMMD) Safety Review, chaired by Baroness Cumberlege in 2020, which looked into cases of patients being harmed by mesh procedures, sodium valproate, and hormone pregnancy tests.

Lady Cumberlege called for the government to launch a redress scheme for patients in order to provide them with financial support without the need for them to go through clinical negligence battles.

Lisa, whose name has been changed to protect her identity, launched her claim in 2016, and it was settled this summer when a judge ruled in her favour.

Documents shared with The Independent reveal that NHS lawyers argued she was being “dishonest” about her injuries, and presented video surveillance. The judge subsequently ruled that she had not been dishonest.

Speaking about her ordeal, Lisa said: “Once they decided that I’d been dishonest, it changed from admitting liability to basically working out pain levels and stuff like that, and I had to prove that I wasn’t being dishonest. It was genuinely the worst thing I’ve ever gone through, ever. There’s not even a word that I can use to describe it, to say how it made me feel. The stress of it was just immense."

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Source: The Independent, 11 September 2022

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