How to Claim for Hospital Negligence

Whenever you are a patient in hospital, you are owed a duty of care, which means that there are certain standards you are entitled to expect to receive whilst you are being looked after in hospital.  If you are worried that the hospital have breached their duty of care to you, then you might have a claim for clinical negligence.

In the first instance, if the incident happened within the last year, then you might like to make a formal written NHS complaint to the Chief Executive of the NHS Trust.  If you do that, then the Trust are duty bound to investigate your complaint, and they will respond to you in writing at the end of that process to confirm their findings.  They might also offer to meet with you in person to talk about the incident in more detail.  The process is worthwhile, because if their investigation uncovers any evidence of wrong doing, then the Duty of Candour imposed on the Trust means that they have to be open and honest with you about that. 

If their reply contains any confirmation that there have been problems with your care, then that can be helpful information to give to a Solicitor if you are thinking about taking the matter further and pursuing a claim for compensation.  The complaint process may result in an apology from the Trust, but it will not result in any financial compensation even if your complaint is upheld.

If the incident happened in the last 3 years, or if you first learnt that the care you received might be negligent in the last 3 years, then you could make a clinical negligence claim. 

You might find it helpful to write down your memory of the incident, because as time moves on it is natural to forget certain details that might be important later.  If you have an injury or scarring, then it could be helpful to take photographs to show the extent of the injury before the healing process started.

If a Solicitor thinks the prospects of your claim being successful are in excess of 51%, then they will usually start investigating the claim by requesting copies of all the relevant medical records. This will help to confirm the chronology of your care and try to pinpoint evidence to confirm where things might have gone wrong.  The input of independent medical experts will be vital in confirming where things have gone wrong and how you have been harmed as a result.

Once your Solicitor has evidence about what went wrong and how it has impacted you, they will write a Letter of Claim to the Hospital Trust to notify them of the claim against them and set out what has happened.  The Trust’s insurers will then have 4 months to investigate the allegations of negligence before confirming whether they admit liability or not.

If you are successful with your claim, then you will be entitled to compensation for the avoidable impact of the incident.  This relates to your physical and psychological symptoms as well as any financial losses and expenses you might have incurred. If you have bought anything as a result of the incident, then keep hold of any receipts.  If you have lost income because of the incident, then keep your wage slips so you can document the difference in earnings.

How can we help?

The amount of investigation work needed in these types of claims are often very involved, so if you are worried about treatment you have had, you should seek help sooner rather than later. 

If you would like a free, no obligation conversation with one of our medical negligence solicitors, get in touch by calling 0178 232 4454, complete our contact form, or send us an email via info@smithpartnership.co.uk.

We also have expert medical negligence solicitors at our offices across the East Midlands, in Burton, Derby, Leicester and Swadlincote.