Making a Medical Negligence Claim

The NHS complaints scheme

If you feel you have suffered an injury as a result of medical treatment the first thing to do is to contact the treating hospital or GP's surgery. There is a complaints system in operation for all hospitals and GP surgeries. Dentists and other healthcare professionals are also likely to operate their own complaints system. One of our specialist medical and clinical negligence solicitors will be able to give you advice on making a complaint under this system.

Your complaint will be investigated by the hospital or GP and you should receive an explanation as to what they feel happened to you. You may also get an apology. If you need monetary compensation however this is unlikely to be provided. If your complaint is upheld or it is denied and you wish to take matters further our specialist medical and clinical negligence team will help you take the next step towards your goal. It may be that the next appropriate step to consider is litigation - making a legal claim.

Making a negligence claim

In our experience one of the first things you will want to know is whether you have a potentially successful claim. One of our experienced medical negligence team will be able to give you an initial view as to whether we feel your claim could succeed. If we think you might have a claim we will advise you what it will take to win your claim and secure compensation.

You are entitled to copies of your GP and hospital records. It would help us judge your claim's chances of success if you can show these documents to us when we first meet. To obtain copies of your medical records all you have to do is write to your GP or treating hospital to request them. You may be charged a fee of up to £50. If in doubt, please contact us and one of our experienced medical negligence team will assist you.

Making a claim - the legal theory

To be successful in a claim for medical negligence you need to prove that the treating doctor or other health professional breached the duty of care that they owed to you and that this breach caused you to suffer injury.

• Breach of duty
  In order to prove that the health professional was in breach of their duty it is necessary to show that the treatment provided did not meet the standard of a reasonably competent doctor or practitioner in that particular field of expertise. The doctor who treated you does not have to be the best in his field, but he must not be the worst.
• The cause of the injury: "causation"
  This is often the most difficult part of the claim to prove. If it can be proved that the doctor was in breach of his duty of care, it must then be shown that it was that breach which directly caused the injury or was a major contributing factor towards the injury.

The mechanics of making a claim

• Your statement
  At the outset of your claim it is very important that you tell us everything you can remember about the events which you believe caused your injury. We will then help you to set out your recollection of events in a written statement. If your claim involves an injury sustained at the time of your child's birth it is also useful to have statements from anyone else who was in the delivery room with you (aside from the healthcare professionals).
• Investigation
  Your solicitor will then review your medical records and instruct a leading independent expert in the same area of medicine as the doctor or other person who we think may have been negligent. The expert will be asked to write a report on the treatment you received. If that report states that your treatment was substandard then a further report may be obtained from the same or a different expert examining whether the substandard treatment caused or contributed to your injury.
• The start of your claim
  Once your claim has been fully investigated we will set out the allegations of negligence against the hospital or doctor in a detailed 'letter of claim'. This letter gives full details of the allegations of negligence and the injuries which have been suffered as a result.
  The letter gives the healthcare professional the opportunity to admit they were negligent. If responsibility is not admitted, it may be necessary for court proceedings to begin.