Lees Solicitors - Investigating Your Clinical Negligence Claim - Roneeta Lodh

Clinical Negligence News

Investigating Your Clinical Negligence Claim - Roneeta Lodh


Investigating Your Clinical Negligence Claim - Roneeta Lodh

When a client approach us about a potential claim, one of the first questions that we are often asked is how long it will take to investigate their case. Unfortunately, this is not an easy question to answer, with the answer varying from case to case.

For the most straightforward of cases, the investigation period takes in the region of six months, but in most cases, this will take at least a year.

If we decide to take on your claim, before we can proceed with our investigations, it is important that the appropriate funding arrangements are put in place. There are four possible funding options that may be entered into depending on the means and circumstances of each client. These are: -

  1. Legal Aid
  2. Legal Expenses Insurance
  3. Conditional Fee Agreement ("No Win No Fee")
  4. Private Funding

Once funding has been put in place, the next stage is to obtain medical records from all of your care providers, e.g. your GP and/ or hospitals where you were treated.

The medical records will hold vital information about what has happened to you and may also contain information about your current condition and long term prognosis.

When requesting medical records from the Defendant, we would also notify them that we are investigating a potential claim against them.

Once received, the records will then be passed to a medical records clerk who will sort and paginate these, before preparing a chronology setting out the key information in your case.

At this point, we would go through the chronology with you and ensure that we have received all relevant records, and also check whether there is anything in the records that does not match your recollection of events.

The next important step in the investigation is the instruction of an independent expert to comment on the treatment that has been given, and whether this fell below the standard that could reasonably be expected in the circumstances.

The type of expert involved will depend on the nature of your case and who provided the alleged negligent treatment.

In some cases, more than one expert will be needed to consider the issues in the case, depending on how complicated these are.

After receiving the expert evidence, we will then discuss this with you and if necessary hold a conference so that we can discuss the issues stemming from any reports. At this point, we would also consider whether your case would also benefit form the input of a barrister, who could consider the legal position of the case.

Once these steps have been taken, we will have a much clearer idea of what the prospects of success are in your case.

If there are sufficient prospects of success, we would then prepare a "Letter of Claim" to be sent to the Defendant. Essentially, this is a detailed letter setting out the relevant history and what allegations are being made.

The Defendant then has a period of three months following receipt of this to investigate the claim and instruct their own experts if necessary to consider the case.

In their response, the Defendant may either admit, partly admit or deny liability and this will clearly have an effect on how we would proceed with the claim and whether it will be necessary to issue Court proceedings.

The Clinical Negligence Team at Lees Solicitors LLP is able to advise and represent clients in claims relating to negligent incidents, not only in medical and surgical situations, but also in other areas of associated practice such as nursing, dentistry, chiropody and optometrics. Please contact a member of our team on 0151 647 9381 or 0800 387 927 for further information.

Roneeta Lodh

 

This article provides a summary of a recent case/change in law/news item. It is intended for general information purposes only and is not to be relied upon. It does not constitute legal advice and should not be treated under any circumstances as a substitute for legal advice. Lees Solicitors LLP does not accept any responsibility for any loss that may arise from reliance upon the information contained within this article. The copyright in this article is owned by Lees Solicitors LLP and permission must be sought before reproduction or publishing.

 


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