Barcan Woodward
Clinical Negligence
Advice if you have had problems with medical treatment provided by a GP, hospital doctor, dentist or other health care professional.
- FREE legal advice - Contact Us
- A medical accident has happened - what do you want to achieve?
- What is Medical/Clinical Negligence?
- How do I get more information about my medical treatment?
- How to complain about medical treatment
- How do I claim compensation?
- How much will it cost to make a claim?
- How can I pay?
- How long will the claim take?
- How we can help you
- Read about our Personal and Medical Injuries Department
- Some of our cases
- Inquests
- Types of Claims
- Meet the Team
- Press Release
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A Medical Accident Has Happened - What Do You Want To Achieve?
You have put your health and life in the hands of a doctor or other health professional and something has gone wrong. You may have ended up worse than you were before. When something like this happens, emotions tend to run high and there are likely to be a number of matters concerning you. Typically we hear:
We are highly experienced in dealing with all these medical negligence issues. The very first thing we always do is to find out from you what your priorities are. What do you see as your objective in “taking matters further”. Wherever possible we will then help you to achieve satisfaction, either ourselves or by referring you to other agencies better able to help.
What is Clinical Negligence?
This is the area of law, which enables people to recover financial compensation when they have suffered injury and loss through poor medical treatment.
A doctor, dentist or other health care professional only gives negligent medical treatment if they fail to provide a service that meets the minimum acceptable standards of their profession. They may have made a mistake during an operation, missed a diagnosis, prescribed the wrong medicine or simply failed to inform someone of the risks associated with treatment. Just because a mistake has been made does not mean you are automatically entitled to compensation. - this depends on the nature of the mistake and the circumstances in which it was made.
Proving negligence is only half the battle. To get compensation you must also show that it was the negligent treatment that caused the injury or loss complained of. For example, if Mr X went into hospital with an infection in his leg and was not given the right antibiotics quickly enough, he might well be able to show he was the victim of negligent treatment. Assume he has to have his leg amputated. He is only entitled to compensation for the loss of his leg if he can prove that the proper antibiotics given at the right time would probably have saved the leg. If the infection was already so bad when he went to the hospital that he was probably going to lose the leg anyway, he gets no compensation for the amputation, no matter how bad the negligence.
In legal terms the issue of causation - what caused the injuries - is just as difficult as negligence - whether there was sub-standard treatment - and often more so.
Clinical Negligence is a complicated area of law. To receive proper legal advice it is essential to go to a specialist legal department. If your legal team is headed by a panel member of Action Against Medical Negligence (AvMA) or a member of the The Clinical Negligence Accreditation Scheme, and holds a Clinical Negligence franchise from the Legal Services Commission, it will be competent at dealing with this type of claim. AvMA or the Legal Services Commission can give you details of a suitable solicitor in your area.
How do I get more information about my treatment?
How do I get more information about my treatment? You should start by asking whoever treated you to explain what happened. If you are not satisfied with the response you receive you may wish to make a complaint. Complaints procedures are described below.
It is often useful to get copies of your medical records at an early stage. These should give full details of the medical treatment you received. In most circumstances you are entitled to see your medical records under the Access to Health Records Act 1990. You have to make a written application to the person or organisation that holds your medical records. These are not held centrally, so for example, you may need to write separately to your family doctor for the GP records and to your local hospital for the hospital notes and X-rays. You may well receive a form to fill in before the copies are made. There will be a fee to pay. The maximum that can be charged is £50, but remember that if you want records from more than one source, you will be charged up to £50 each time The £50 maximum fee covers all administrative charges, photocopying, postage and even copies of X-rays if you need these.
Certainly, if you instruct a firm of specialist solicitors one of the first things they will do is obtain your medical records. These should give full details of the medical treatment you received. The records will form the basis of any investigations into that treatment along with your account of what happened.
You may not be able to understand fully the medical treatment you received and why things ended up as they did from the medical records alone. However, if something has gone wrong, whoever treated you should be able to explain what happened in terms that you can understand.
How do I claim compensation?
Since medical/clinical negligence is a complicated area we strongly advise you to seek help from a solicitor before you consider claiming. A solicitor can advise you about the complicated procedures involved and find suitable medical experts to look at your claim to help decide whether or not it is worth pursuing.
In some cases before you start claiming compensation it is better to go through the hospital‘s complaints procedure. Your solicitor will be able to give you guidance about this.
If the matter has not been resolved by the complaints procedure, or if that route is not appropriate, you may then wish to claim compensation.
Your solicitor will wish to obtain your medical records. He or she will then find a suitable medical expert who can review the treatment you received. The expert will read your medical records and consider your account of what happened and prepare a report. An expert may be asked to give preliminary advice to see whether it is worth investigating the matter further. This is because reports are expensive. There may be no point in asking a medical expert to do a thorough review of all the medical records and treatment history if, the expert can see quickly that the claim is unlikely to succeed. Equally, a preliminary advice may identify other aspects to be investigated and perhaps experts from other specialties to consult.
It may be necessary to instruct more than one expert. It all depends on the nature of the treatment that led to the complaint.
The solicitor will then want to devise a case plan setting out the steps to be taken in the future. This will have to be reviewed frequently because the work required may change as the case goes along.
Pursuing a simple claim will involve the following:
Note: This is very much an outline of what happens. Many stages have been left out or simplified.
How much will it cost to make a claim?
It depends entirely on the nature of the claim you are making. If your opponent agrees you are entitled to compensation then it will cost a lot less than if there is a dispute that has to be decided in a court case. Investigating a straightforward case is unlikely to cost less than about £2,000. At the other end of the scale a case in which there is a dispute about the treatment and the amount of compensation could cost £50,000 or more if it goes to a full trial and complex, high value cases can cost a lot more. That said, if your claim is accepted by your opponent or you win at Trial, the opponent will usually have to pay most of your legal costs and expenses as well as your compensation.
How can I pay?
Your solicitor will advise you at the start about the different ways of covering legal costs and the other expenses of bringing a claim. Barcan Woodward can offer a No Win, No Fee arrangement in suitable cases. There are many other ways of covering legal costs including: Legal Aid/Public Funding; Legal Expenses Insurance; Trade Union/Staff Association funding; After the event insurance, or just paying privately as you go. We will always advise on the options and the best way for you to fund your claim.
How long will the claim take?
It is unlikely that a clinical negligence claim will take less than a year. It will probably take quite a lot longer. It depends on the nature of the claim and whether there is a dispute about who is at fault and the amount of compensation being sought. If there is no dispute and the amount of compensation sought is relatively modest it will take a lot less than if there is a dispute and the compensation sought is large.
How we can help you
We are experts at recovering compensation for clients who have been injured by medical mistakes. We also try to help clients to get back to as normal a life as possible by arranging rehabilitative medical treatment, giving advice about employment, retraining and other matters that can improve quality of life.
The partners in the Personal and Medical Injury Department, Richard Barcan and Marina van Vessem are very experienced at dealing with clinical negligence claims.
Richard is a panel member of Action Against Medical Accidents (AvMA), which means he is recognised as an expert in the field. Chambers Guide to the Legal Profession acknowledges he is a “leader in his field” and the department is "A strong team with a reputation for fantastic client care headed by the pre-eminent Richard Barcan"
If you are considering making a claim or have any other enquiries please telephone Richard or Marina.
Over the years the department has dealt with hundreds of clinical negligence claims recovering compensation running into millions of pounds.
Our Personal and Medical Injuries Department
Our Personal and Medical Injuries Department is based in the centre of Bristol.
The partner in charge of the department, Richard Barcan is a panel member of Action Against Medical Accidents (AvMA) which means he is recognised as an expert in the field. Chambers Guide to the Legal Profession acknowledges he is a “leader in his field” and the department is "A strong team with a reputation for fantastic client care headed by the pre-eminent Richard Barcan".
Richard supervises the work of the department, which has a franchise from the Legal Services Commission to take on publicly funded clients.
Marina Van Vessem is the other partner who supervises this work. She too is very experienced at dealing with these claims.
Richard and Marina are supported by a strong team of specialist solicitors who also handle claims.
The other members of the Personal and Medical Injuries Team are:
- Richard Harries (Associate)
- Myfanwy Buckeridge (Senior Solicitor) member of The Personal Injury Accreditation Scheme
- Maria Voisin (Senior Solicitor) member of the The Clinical Negligence Accreditation Scheme and is a panel member of Action against Medical Accidents (AvMA)
- Amie Prowle (Solicitor)
- Kerstin Scheel (Solicitor)