Medical professionals do their best to provide their patients with the best standard of care, but sometimes things go wrong. When mistakes happen in the medical service, there are many people who have fought for compensation and won. According to the latest figures, claims for medical negligence have gone up significantly, despite recent changes to the law.
Medical Claims Have Gone Up
According to a recent NHS review, the number of claims in England has gone up from 10,129 to 11,945 between March 2013 and March 2014. This is an increase of 18%, which is thought to be caused by a number of no-win, no-fee cases in the system. Recently these types of cases have been banned, but a number of historic cases are still going through. Some of the latest forecasts are suggesting that the bill for medical negligence will soon reach £19 billion, which is almost one fifth of the total NHS budget and an enormous strain on the UK health care system.
Many argue that without no-win no-fee arrangements, many people will not have the financial means to make a claim when they feel like they have been wronged. It also means that those who win their claim will need to use part of their compensation to cover their legal costs. There is also the fear that some medical negligence and personal injury lawyers will only focus on the largest cases, or those cases that have a better chance of success.
Experts on medical negligence claims say that many of the patients feel like they are forced to take legal action because the hospitals are refusing to apologise for their mistakes or explain why they failed. The NHS desperately needs to reduce its bill by not repeating the same errors and by admitting to mistakes, so that the legal fees and compensation doesn’t become so expensive.
Further Increase in Medical Claims Predicted
According to lawyers, it is predicted that there will be a large increase in medical negligence claims in future years. A report recently released after a public enquiry by Robert Francis QC in February into failings at Mid Staffordshire Hospital Foundation trust found that between 400-1,200more patients died than should have been expected. The shocking findings of this report have made victims of medical negligence in the public more likely to take action and make a claim.
If you are someone who has suffered from medical negligence, you might want to consider making a claim against the hospital. Medical negligence, whether it is a miss-diagnosis, giving you the wrong medicine, failing to provide you with accurate care or making a mistake during a procedure, can have very serious consequences. In many cases these mistakes have resulted in the worsening of the condition, serious injury and even death. Talk to a lawyer who specialises in medical negligence to learn more about the process and find out if you can claim for compensation.