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Found 135 results
  1. News Article
    Alice and Lewis Jones were forced to watch their 18-month-old baby die in front of them after a failure by a scandal-hit NHS trust left him with a “catastrophic brain injury” following his birth. Their son Ronnie was one of hundreds of babies who have died following errors by Shrewsbury and Telford Hospital, where the largest NHS maternity scandal to date was previously uncovered by The Independent. Two years later, Mr and Mrs Jones are calling for the Supreme Court to overturn a controversial decision in February which ruled bereaved relatives could not claim compensation over the psychological impact of seeing a loved one die, even if it was caused by medical negligence. It comes after the trust admitted to failings in a letter to the parents’ lawyers. Ronnie’s birth in 2020 fell outside of the Ockenden review and his parents have warned it showed failures were still occurring despite warnings made during the inquiry. Within the Ockenden inquiry, multiple cases of staff failing to recognise and act upon CTG training were found, and the final report recommended all hospitals have systems to ensure staff are trained and up to date in CTG and emergency skills. The report also said the NHS should make CTG training mandatory and that clinicians must not work in labour wards or provide childbirth care without it. A CTG measures a baby’s heart and monitors conditions in the uterus and is an important measure before birth and during labour to observe the baby for any signs of distress. Ms Jones said: “We knew about the Ockenden review, but everything at Telford was new and so I think we just assumed that lessons had been learned, the same thing wouldn’t happen to us.” Ronnie’s parents are campaigning to reverse the Supreme Court which ruled that “secondary victims” – including parents who are not directly harmed by the birth – are not eligible to bring claims for psychiatric injury following medical negligence. Read full story Source: The Independent, 14 March 2024
  2. Content Article
    The total value of clinical claims associated with emergency medicine was nearly £700m in 2022/23, making them the second highest total value of claims by speciality. This podcast focuses on clinical negligence claims from the emergency department, and how insights from claims data can be used by emergency medicine teams to help improve safety. Hosted by Justine Sharpe from NHS Resolution's Safety and Learning team, the episode features guests from NHS England’s Getting It Right First Time team and the Royal College of Emergency Medicine. Topics covered include: The key themes and recommendations from NHS Resolution's 2022 ED reports, including discussion of cauda equina and aortic dissection How to use local claims data from NHSR and operational performance data from GIRFT to inform safer patient care Insights into specialty reviews and handover, communication and the importance of multidisciplinary ED teams.
  3. News Article
    The Priory healthcare group has been fined more than £650,000 over the death of a 23-year-old patient who was hit by a train after absconding from a mental health hospital. Matthew Caseby, a personal trainer, was able to leave Birmingham’s Priory hospital Woodbourne by scaling a wall after being “inappropriately unattended” for several minutes in September 2020, an inquest jury ruled in 2022. The healthcare company pleaded guilty to a criminal safety failing linked to the death of a patient, breaching the 2008 Health and Social Care Act, at Birmingham magistrates court on Friday. The London-based provider was charged after an investigation into the death of Caseby conducted by the Care Quality Commission. Caseby’s father, Richard Caseby, who had been campaigning for a prosecution of the healthcare organisation, told the court the company attempted to “evade accountability for its gross failures”. In a victim impact statement which he presented as part of the prosecution on Friday, he said: “I found it unbelievable that a private company commissioned by the NHS to care for its most vulnerable psychiatric patients in the greatest crisis of their lives could be so cruel and resort to such desperate tactics to hide the truth.” Read full story Source: The Guardian, 8 March 2024
  4. Event
    Featuring leading legal experts and experienced clinicians this event will provide an update on current claims processes and how to respond to claims. The conference will look at the patient perspective and explore why patients decide to litigate. There will be an extended session on mediation and ADR. The conference will also update delegates on the new Patient Safety Incident Response Framework (PSIRF) and implications for Clinical Negligence Litigation. The conference will also consider current issues topical in clinical negligence including Maternity Safety and clinical negligence reform. Throughout the day, there will be interactive sessions, small breakout groups, and collaborative exercises, fostering a dynamic learning experience. This conference will enable you to: Network with colleagues with an interest in clinical negligence. Learn from outstanding practice in responding to claims. Reflect on national developments and learning. Understand the patient perspective and why patients decide to litigate. Explore the impact of the new Patient Safety Incident Response Framework on Clinical Negligence claims and litigation. Improve the way claims are responded to and improve practice in mediation and ADR. Develop your skills in learning from claims to reduce avoidable harm. Understand how you can bring together Complaints, Claims and Patients Safety Investigation. Identify key strategies for supporting staff who are the subject of a claim. Reflect on the progress towards clinical negligence reform and how the system may change. Understand the standards to which services will be judged during the Pandemic. Ensure you are up to date with the latest data with regard to learning from obstetric and maternity claims. Self assess and reflect on your own practice. Supports CPD professional development and acts as revalidation evidence. This course provides 5 Hrs training for CPD subject to peer group approval for revalidation purposes. Register Follow on Twitter @HCUK_Clare #ClinicalNegligence hub members receive a 20% discount. Email info@pslhub.org for discount code.
  5. News Article
    The NHS paid out tens of millions of pounds over maternity failings at a hospital trust which is the subject of a major inquiry. Including legal fees, £101m was paid in claims against Nottingham University Hospitals (NUH) between 2006 and 2023. NUH is facing the UK's largest-ever maternity review, with hundreds of baby deaths and injuries being examined. Experts say lives could be saved if the trust invested more in learning from its mistakes. The NHS paid the money in relation to 134 cases over failings at the Queen's Medical Centre (QMC) and City Hospital. The majority - £85m - was damages for families who were successful in proving their baby's death or injury was a result of medical negligence. Read full story Source: BBC News, 28 February 2024
  6. Event
    NHS Resolution’s Safety and Learning team, are hosting a virtual forum on perspectives on delivering health in the prison and justice system. The purpose is to raise awareness of the cost and scale of harm, discuss the realities, best practice, challenges and recommendations around collaborating to support healthcare delivery in the justice system. The format is interactive, with presentations followed by questions and panel discussion. Event programme: Learning from prison claims – NHS Resolution The realities of delivering healthcare in prison – Practice Plus Group The medico-legal aspect of prison health claims – Bevan Brittan Q&A panel discussion Contributors: Natalie Miller – Deputy Regional Manager for West Midland Prisons (Practice Plus Group) Ruth Kavanagh – Clinical Quality and Patient Safety Lead (NHS England) Michelle Hodgkinson – Lead Commissioner (NHS England) Jo Easterbrook – Partner (Bevan Brittan) Julie Charlton – Partner (Bevan Brittan) Samantha Thomas – National Safety and Learning Lead for General Practice (NHS Resolution) Dr Anwar Khan – Senior Clinical Advisor for General Practice (NHS Resolution) Register
  7. Content Article
    The recent Hughes Report outlined the options for redress for those harmed by valproate and pelvic mesh  In this blog, AvMa's Chief Executive, Paul Whiteing, discusses the trade-off of redress schemes.
  8. News Article
    Legal costs in Irish medical negligence cases are among the highest in the world, according to a report that says the slow pace of legal actions here is damaging patients and doctors’ mental wellbeing. The average cost of a legal claim for medical negligence in Ireland is almost three times higher than in the UK, and cases take over 50 per cent longer to resolve, the industry report says. Patients and doctors in Ireland are dragged through what can be a brutal process, for longer than necessary, with patients having to wait longer to receive compensation, the report by the Medical Protection Society (MPS) asserts. In the report, the society, which provides indemnity cover for 16,000 doctors and other healthcare professionals in Ireland, compared the length and cost of legal actions here with other jurisdictions in which it operates. A medical negligence claim in Ireland takes 1,462 days on average (four years), 14% longer than in South Africa and 56% longer than in Hong Kong, the UK or Singapore, it found. Two hundred doctors in Ireland were interviewed for the report: 88% said they were worried about the length of time the litigation process was taking and 91% were worried about their mental wellbeing while it was ongoing. Some said they needed professional help, experienced suicidal thoughts, or quit medicine as a result of the claim. “It was horrendous. I had to leave medicine after it,” says one doctor involved in a claim who is quoted in the report. “I developed severe anxiety during the course of the claim and PTSD. I lost my career in medicine and I am devastated about that. I knew I could never go through the same again.” Read full story Source: The Irish Times, 31 January 2024
  9. Event
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    Kennedys' healthcare team are delighted to invite you to the second session of our annual healthcare seminar programme 2024, which will be held both in-person and virtually on Wednesday 28 February. Guest speaker: John Mead, Technical Claims Director, NHS Resolution John Mead studied at London University and then joined the insurance industry, where he dealt with a wide range of claims against local authorities, some of which reached the Court of Appeal and House of Lords. He moved to NHS Resolution in 1999 and has led the Technical Claims Unit since its creation in 2000, in which he is responsible for overseeing large, complex and potentially repercussive claims against NHS bodies and other scheme members. John is a Fellow of the Chartered Insurance Institute and an accredited mediator. He is an editor for the Journal of Patient Safety and Risk Management, and has contributed to a number of books, most recently Lessons from Medico-Legal Cases in Obstetrics and Gynaecology (2022). This session will be chaired by Kennedys' Partner and Global Head of Healthcare Christopher Malla. Register
  10. News Article
    The trusts paying the highest premiums for clinical negligence as a proportion of their income have been revealed through HSJ analysis of internal data. Several acute trusts in and around London are now spending more than 4% of their income on premium costs to insure themselves against clinical negligence, according to internal NHS data. One expert suggested trusts with higher proportions of ethnic minority patients often have high rates of negligence claims against them, partly due to the complexity of medical presentation, but also communication problems. Lisa Jordan, head of medical negligence at law firm Irwin Mitchell, said trusts that act as tertiary referral centres tend to admit the most complex cases, which are more likely to lead to claims. She added: “Trusts in areas with higher proportions of ethnic minority groups, also often have higher rates. That is in part about the complexity of medical presentation, and also communication problems.” Helen Hughes, chief executive of Patient Safety Learning, said: “Scarce funds that could be spent proactively improving the quality of care are being spent on the costs of error and harm.” Read full story (paywalled) Source: HSJ, 13 December 2023
  11. News Article
    The government faces a rebellion with at least 30 Tories backing an amendment to extend interim payouts to more victims of the infected blood scandal. Up to 30,000 people were given contaminated blood products in the 1970s and 80s. Thousands have died. A Labour amendment will be brought on Monday calling for a new body to be set up to administer compensation. More than 100 MPs, including Tories Sir Robert Buckland, Sir Edward Leigh and David Davis, are backing the move. In a letter sent to Chancellor Jeremy Hunt, shadow chancellor Rachel Reeves called the scandal "one of the most appalling tragedies in our country's recent history." She added: "Blood infected with hepatitis C and HIV has stolen life, denied opportunities and harmed livelihoods." She praised Theresa May, who set up the Infected Blood Inquiry when she was prime minister in 2017. But she warned: "For the victims, time matters. It is estimated that every four days someone affected by infected blood dies." The chancellor, himself a former health secretary, told the inquiry in July that the government accepted the moral case for compensation. But he said no final decisions could be made before the inquiry publishes its findings - now expected in March next year. In August 2022, the government agreed to make the first interim compensation payments of £100,000 each to about 4,000 surviving victims and bereaved widows. But inquiry chairman Sir Brian Langstaff, said in April this year that the parents and children of victims should also receive compensation and also called for a full compensation scheme to be set up immediately. The Commons Speaker will decide on Monday which amendments to the bill MPs will vote on. But the government has said it will not be supporting the amendment. A Department of Health spokesperson said: "We are deeply sympathetic to the strength of feeling on this and understand the need for action. However, it would not be right to pre-empt the findings of the final report into infected blood." Read full story Source: BBC News, 3 December 2023
  12. Event
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    NHS Resolution’s Safety and Learning team, are hosting a virtual forum on perspectives on delivering health in the prison and justice system. The purpose is to raise awareness of the cost and scale of harm, discuss the realities, best practice, challenges and recommendations around collaborating to support healthcare delivery in the justice system. We will hear from a diverse range of experts in the field. The format is interactive, with presentations followed by questions and panel discussion. Event programme: Learning from prison claims - NHS Resolution The realities of delivering healthcare in prison - Practice Plus Group Good practice and themes from inspections - HM Inspectorate of Prisons The medico-legal aspect of prison health claims - Bevan Brittan Q&A panel discussion. Register
  13. News Article
    A woman who suffered traumatic complications from a vaginal mesh implant has been awarded a record settlement of at least £1m from the NHS. Yvette Greenway-Mansfield, 59, was given a mesh implant at Coventry’s University Hospital in 2009 and went on to suffer serious complications. Her medical negligence claim against the hospital trust found that the surgery was carried out prematurely and unnecessarily and that her consent form had been doctored to include additional risks after Greenway-Mansfield had signed it. Greenway-Mansfield said that being awarded the compensation was a “huge relief”, but added that many other women who have suffered similar damage had received little or no compensation, and criticised the government’s failure to establish a financial redress agency for victims. “I’m not the only one. There are thousands of mes,” she said. “There should be a pot of money to provide damages for these women and a care plan in place as an automatic response to mesh-damaged people. It comes down to a perception of women and women’s health problems. We’ve all had enough of it.” Read full story Source: The Guardian, 13 November 2023
  14. News Article
    The daughter of a man who took his own life after experiencing years of pain linked to botched dental surgery said she had "lost faith in the system". Clive Worthington, from Harlow, Essex, travelled to Hungary for dental implants in 2008. Several follow-up procedures from the same dentist back in the UK over the next seven years were unsuccessful. The government said it was addressing a so-called loophole which meant the 81-year-old missed out on compensation. Last week, an inquest concluded Mr Worthington's death in 2022 was a suicide. Senior Essex coroner Lincoln Brookes said the "long-term consequences" of Mr Worthington's unsuccessful dental surgery "impacted significantly on his mental health and ability to cope with daily life". In 2017, the General Dental Council (GDC) found Dr Eszter Gömbös, who was employed by Perfect Profiles, at fault for the work. Mr Worthington was awarded £117,378 in damages and legal costs at Chelmsford County Court in November 2019 - one of the highest pay-outs for dental negligence in the UK. But the insurer which covered Dr Gömbös - the Dental Defence Union (DDU) - argued "discretionary indemnity" and refused to pay. Read full story Source: BBC News, 12 October 2023 Related hub content “I’ve been mocked, scolded and gaslighted”: a harmed patient’s experience of orthodontic treatment A patient harmed by orthodontic treatment shares their story We want to hear from patients with experience of NHS and/or private orthodontists and dentists in any healthcare setting, including community practices and hospitals. Did the orthodontist/dentist give you the treatment and support you needed? If you had ongoing problems, how did the orthodontist/dentist and other healthcare professionals respond? Have you tried to make a complaint? Share your experience of orthodontist and dentistry services
  15. News Article
    A private healthcare provider has been ordered to pay more than £1.5m – the largest fine issued for such a case – after pleading guilty in a criminal prosecution brought by the Care Quality Commission (CQC) over the death of a young woman at Cygnet Hospital Ealing in July 2019. It is the highest ever fine issued to a mental health service following a prosecution by the CQC. The firm pleaded guilty to one offence of failing to provide safe care and treatment, acknowledging failures to: provide a safe ward environment to reduce the risk of people being able to use a ligature; ensure staff observed people intermittently in line with the company procedures; and train staff to be able to resuscitate patients in an emergency. The offences related to the case of a young woman who was admitted to a ward in Cygnet Hospital Ealing in November 2018. In July 2019, she took her own life while on the ward. CQC said Cygnet Ealing had been aware the young woman tried to harm herself in an almost identical way four months earlier, but had failed to mitigate the known environmental risk she was exposed to. Read full story (paywalled) Source: HSJ, 21 September 2023
  16. Content Article
    Extravasation is the leakage of intravenously administered solution into surrounding tissues, which can cause serious damage to the patient. There are multiple guidelines and local policies relating to extravasation injuries but not a singular national uniform policy.  NHS Resolution share their recent slides on what can be learned from extravasation claims, presented at the IV Therapy Summit.
  17. Event
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    Last year, our helpline advisers dealt with an average of two calls a day relating to complaints – could the caller complain about what had happened? How to complain? Who to complain to? This event is for patients and carers who would like answers to some basic questions about complaining about care. Solicitors Chris James and Josh Hughes from law firm Bolt Burdon Kemp will be joining our Chief Executive Rachel Power in this online event. Between them they’ll: Help people understand the NHS complaints process, including its limitations Describe how to get the most out of making a complaint Explain were the distinction can lie between poor service and a claim in negligence. Register
  18. Event
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    An online half day conference from the Legal Training Consultancy with a panel of seven speakers, including five KCs. Who should attend? The conference will appeal to solicitors, barristers, medical professionals, expert witnesses, NHS Trusts and Private Health Providers, insurers and associations. Topics Causation and divisible vs indivisible injuries. Scope of the Duty of Care. The law on consent to medical treatment following McCullough v Forth Valley Health Board in the Supreme Court. A medical perspective on proposals for reform of medical litigation. Case law update. CCC v Sheffield Teaching Hospitals and “lost years” compensation. Early investigation of cerebral palsy claims: The lessons learned. Speakers: Alexander Hutton KC, Hailsham Chambers Ben Collins KC Old Square Chambers Richard Booth KC, 1 Crown Office Row Richard Baker KC, 7BR Owain Thomas KC 1 Crown Office Row Jeremy Pendlebury, 7BR Hugh Whitfield , Consultant Urological Surgeon Register
  19. Content Article
    In this anonymous blog, a patient shares their experience of orthodontic treatment which they undertook to reduce overcrowding of their teeth. However, instead of solving the problem, the treatment caused multiple, complex dental issues that have resulted in severe pain and a high financial cost. The patient talks about how their orthodontist has been unwilling to take any responsibility for the issues caused, threatening legal action if the patient pursues any claims against them. They also discuss the reluctance of other orthodontists to get involved in trying to treat the issues they now face, and call for regulators and governments to look into the issue of negligent orthodontic treatment.
  20. News Article
    The NHS could face a record compensation bill of more than £60m from civil claims lodged by the families of Lucy Letby’s victims, experts have said. Parents whose babies have disabilities caused by Letby’s attacks at the Countess of Chester hospital could each expect to receive a payout of more than £10m to fund their future care. Compensation paid by the NHS to parents whose babies died or were left with disabilities as a result of care at Shrewsbury hospital in Britain’s largest maternity scandal reportedly amounted to almost £50m. In a separate case, the health service had to pay £37m to a boy who was left brain damaged at birth. Stephen Jones, the head of Leigh Day’s medical negligence team in Manchester, said the trust could argue that by committing the offences, Letby breached the employer-employee relationship to an extent such that it was not responsible for her. But he added: “I think there would be outrage that the trust wouldn’t accept responsibility for babies in their care.” He said compensation could run into eight figures for a family whose baby was severely injured and had a long life expectancy. Emma Wray, a partner in Hodge Jones & Allen’s medical negligence department, suggested the NHS could set up a scheme for victims, as it has done with other scandals, to make claiming compensation easier. Read full story Source: The Guardian, 23 August 2023
  21. News Article
    Three trusts have lost out on more than £1m in rebate from the maternity clinical negligence scheme (CNST) after they ‘mis-declared’ that they were compliant with safety requirements. University Hospitals Sussex Foundation Trust, University Hospitals Morecambe Bay FT and Doncaster and Bassetlaw FT have all received a small amount of funding to implement their action plans but a much larger rebate on the NHS Resolution maternity section of the clinical negligence scheme for trusts has been withheld. This amounted to a loss of close to half a million pounds for Doncaster and Bassetlaw and is likely to be more for the other two trusts, which had made bigger contributions to the maternity section of the CNST. Western Sussex had mis-declared its compliance on five safety actions, BSUH on seven, Doncaster and Bassetlaw on five and UHMB on seven. Read full story (paywalled) Source: HSJ, 26 May 2022
  22. News Article
    More than 200 women were harmed when a rogue surgeon carried out operations on them unnecessarily, an NHS inquiry has found. Some of the women were left with life-changing physical problems or unable to work, while many also suffered trauma and serious psychological harm as a result. Overall, 203 women on whom Anthony Dixon performed procedures between 2007 and 2017 came to harm, according to a review by the North Bristol NHS trust (NBT). Dixon, who for years was Britain’s most influential pelvic surgeon, worked for both the trust and the private Spire hospital in the city. In 2017, NBT launched a review of Dixon’s performance and suspended him after dozens of women he had performed procedures on complained that they had experienced appalling consequences, including unmanageable pain and incontinence. The Guardian revealed in late 2017 that 100 women were suing him for medical negligence. Some cases have since been settled, but dozens are ongoing. NBT sacked Dixon in 2019 and he is currently banned from practising in the UK. During the review, 378 women were recalled and asked to set out their dealings with Dixon. All had undergone a procedure called laparoscopic ventral mesh rectopexy (LVMR), in which plastic mesh is inserted to repair weakened tissue in the pelvic floor. In papers presented to NBT’s board on Thursday, board members were told that the inquiry had concluded. “The trust has notified 203 NHS patients that, although their LVMR operation was carried out satisfactorily, they should have been offered alternative treatments before proceeding to surgery. We have defined these patients as suffering ‘harm’ as a result,” it said. Read full story Source: The Guardian, 26 May 2022
  23. News Article
    Parents whose children have mysteriously fallen ill with hepatitis and received a delayed diagnosis could be entitled to negligence claims, lawyers believe. Officials are no closer to explaining a recent and unusual outbreak in cases of liver inflammation recorded among young children across the UK. To date, a total of 163 children have been diagnosed. Eleven of these have received liver transplants, while 13 are currently in hospital. Globally in recent months, 300 children have been struck down by the illness, which has no clear cause. Because the UK cases have been identified retrospectively, there is potential that doctors and medics may have “missed signs” which would have led to earlier hepatitis diagnoses and treatment, lawyers say. “There are a significant number of these diagnoses which are actually retrospective,” said Jonathan Peacock, a partner at VWV specialising in clinical negligence. “The obvious issue there from a negligence point of view is if you have missed signs, which ought to have led you to a diagnosis of hepatitis earlier, as a result of which it’s gone untreated and the outcome is worse, then potentially you’re negligent. “There’s two stages: was the care diagnosis, treatment, intervention, was that of a reasonable standard? If the answer is no – there was clearly a negligent delay, or a breach of duty of care, then the second question that then arises is has the individual been harmed by that delay?” Read full story Source: The Independent, 10 May 2022
  24. News Article
    Hunt’s radical plan to reform compensation for clinical negligence is “completely unacceptable” says the Association of Personal Injury Lawyers, which includes some of the kinds of firms that urge people to sue the NHS, soliciting online, in TV ads or posters in waiting rooms. Damages paid by the NHS as a result of medical negligence claims have soared exponentially over the last decade, up from £900m to £2.2bn now. Yet despite horror stories of deaths and life-changing damage in badly run maternity wards, the National Audit Office (NAO) finds no evidence of more injuries, only that the number of claims and sums awarded by courts are shooting up. The NAO found that “the claimant’s legal costs exceeded the damages awarded in 61% of claims settled”. Though the lawyers in the clinical compensation business protest vigorously that they defend patients’ rights, the Hunt committee demolishes any justification for the present system. The report quotes Sir Ian Kennedy QC, the chair of many inquiries and emeritus professor of health law and ethics at University College London, who wrote in 2021 that clinical negligence was an “outdated, arbitrary and scandalously expensive system” with a “stranglehold that lawyers exert over a system that should be putting the interests and needs of patients first”. What injured patients need is an independent authority to conduct a speedy and transparent investigation of what went wrong, with everyone free to speak openly, ending in reasonable compensation and a pledge to prevent anyone else being put at risk by the same error. Peter Walsh, the chief executive of Action Against Medical Accidents, told the committee that litigation was often “a last-gasp attempt to get a sense of justice and to get to the bottom of what has actually happened after people have experienced denial after denial”. Instead of a system of delays and denials that frustrates grieving families and terrorises doctors as lawyers seek to pin personal blame on someone, the committee proposes a system closer to those used in New Zealand and Scandinavia. An independent administrative body would investigate a patient’s case to see if the harm done was avoidable and if so, to fix fair compensation briskly within six months. The priority would be openness and learning from mistakes to protect future patients. Not needing to find a person to blame makes it easier for patients to get compensation – but the payout would be far lower. Some warn this lower burden of proof would encourage a flood of claims, but New Zealand found a similar system ended up halving the sums paid out. Read full story Source: The Guardian, 3 May 2022
  25. News Article
    A major reform of the way NHS clinical negligence claims are handled in England is needed, MPs say. The House of Commons' Health and Social Care Committee said the current system was too adversarial, leading to bitter and long legal fights for patients. More than £2bn a year is paid out on claims, but 25% goes to legal fees. An independent body should be set up to adjudicate on cases and the need to prove individual fault should be scrapped, the cross-party group said. Instead, the focus should be whether the system failed, which the MPs believe would create a better culture for learning from mistakes. The committee heard from families who had lost children or whose babies had been left with brain injuries from mistakes made during birth. Parents described how they had to fight for years to get recognition for the harm that had been caused. One woman criticised the "complacent attitude" of the hospital involved, saying they just wanted to put it down to one mistake and carry on as normal. Another woman whose daughter died aged 20 months after errors in her care said she felt lessons had not been learnt despite a settlement in her favour. She said the whole process had left her feeling devastated. The average length of time for these settlements was over 11 years, the committee was told. Read full story Source: BBC News, 27 April 2022
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