How we investigate your claim

The steps involved in a clinical negligence claim

Initial Telephone Contact and Meeting

The first contact will be conducted via a telephone interview with one of our team.  We will obtain as much detail from you as possible regarding your claim and will use this information and supporting documents to assess your case.  If there is not enough information to adequately assess your case, you may be required to complete the complaints process – if required we will guide you through this process.

Once we have gathered and assessed all the necessary information, we will advise you regarding your case, and let you know if you have a case worth investigating.  

The next stage is to arrange a free no obligation meeting where we can discuss the case in more detail and explore the issues with you. This can either be at your home or any one of our 4 offices. This meeting will also cover other important issues such as what needs to be proven in a clinical negligence case and the funding alternatives.

If you chose to continue with the claim then the appropriate funding arrangement will be set up. This may require some paperwork depending on the arrangement, but we can draft this for you.

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What needs to be proven?

In order to proceed with a Clinical Negligence claim we need to prove two elements; breach of duty and causation.

Breach of duty means that we have to prove that the treatment you received fell below the standard that could be expected of a reasonably competent practitioner in that medical field.

In order to prove causation, we need to be able to show that the unreasonable treatment caused your injury, or caused your injury to be worsened.

To prove both of these elements we will need to obtain independent medical opinions: it is not enough to prove either breach of duty or causation, both elements need to be established or the case will fail.

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How we will prove your case

The first thing we must do in a Clinical Negligence claim is obtain all of the medical records in the matter, this includes your GP records as well as records from any NHS trust where you were treated. Under the Data Protection Act, the health care provider has 40 days from the date of our application to provide these records. They are also allowed to charge up to a maximum of £50.00 per set of records.

Once we have all of the medical records, we will review them and if necessary we will complete a witness statement for you. This will be necessary for example in cases where there is a discrepancy between the client’s recollection of events and the medical records. (Sometimes a witness statement will have been necessary earlier in the process in order to apply for the funding arrangement.)

Once the witness statement has been completed, an expert will be contacted to provide a report. Normally we will ask for a breach of duty report first, but this may change depending on the facts of the case. If the breach of duty report is positive, a causation report will be obtained and if this is positive to then we can move forward with the case. It may be necessary for you to be examined in order to complete the above reports but this will depend on the facts of your individual case.

It may be necessary at this time to obtain advice from a barrister if the evidence in the reports is not clear or there are several complicated issues to be considered.

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Informing the Defendants of the claim

Once we are sure that there is a case we then have to send the Defendants a letter of claim. This is a letter which outlines the reasons that we believe the Defendant was negligent and the injuries that you have suffered as a result of that negligence. When we send the medical record authorities, the Defendant will already be aware that there is a claim being investigated towards them, however, they will not know the details of the claim until they receive this letter. The Defendants have 14 days to acknowledge the letter of claim and then 4 months from the date of the letter to investigate and respond.

The next step will depend on the response from the Defendants. If they admit liability then we can move on with valuing the claim, but if they deny liability then we will have to reconsider the case with a view to issuing proceedings to place the claim within the court process. This will be discussed with you in detail if it becomes necessary.

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Seeking Damages

The aim of damages is to help put you in a position as close as possible to that which you would have been in had the negligence not occurred. Damages are made up of 2 elements, general and special damages, but you will receive one lump sum containing both of these.

General damages are the amount to compensate you for pain suffering and loss of amenity. This is a figure decided upon using a book called the “Judicial Studies Board Guidelines” and past case law.  

Special damages are your out of pocket expenses; this can include for example loss of earnings, travel expenses, medical expenses and a care claim. This will take account of both the losses you have already incurred and in the most serious cases, losses that you will incur in the future as a result of the Defendant’s negligence. It is important that we can prove these losses to the Defendant and therefore we would urge you to keep hold of any receipts or other proof you have in relation to any of the losses you have incurred.

It is very difficult to give an accurate estimate of the damages you could hope to receive at the beginning of the claim, as they will depend on the length of your recovery and the expenses you have and will incur. We will need medical evidence before an accurate estimation can be given of the amount of damages you are likely to receive and often this can be quite complicated and involve a number of experts.