Frequently Asked Questions

It is crucial that you take steps to protect your health and wellbeing immediately after a medical accident. This may involve seeking medical attention, seeking further options or advice on your circumstances, and obtaining help and assistance from family friends and independent support groups. You may also need to seek financial assistance from your bank, mortgage lender or the Department for Work and Pensions, especially if you are unable to work for a period of time and suffer a loss of income as a result.
It is not mandatory to make a complaint before instructing a solicitor to investigate your medical negligence claim, but in some circumstances it can be worthwhile making a formal complaint about the standard of treatment that you have received to the healthcare provider.
You may also find that the healthcare provider has carried out its own investigation into the standard of care provided to you, and they may provide you with a copy of their report outlining their conclusions.
Each healthcare provider will have their own complaints procedure. If the allegedly negligent care was provided by your GP or dentist, the complaint should be directed to the practice. Complaints about care provided in and NHS hospital should be directed to the Patient Advice and Liaison Service (PALS) at the relevant NHS trust. Concerns about private treatment should be directed to the relevant provider. If you remain unsatisfied when you receive the reply to complaint, you may wish to take the matter to the Health Service Ombudsman.
The benefit of making a complaint is that it gives the healthcare provider the opportunity to investigate your issues and provide a response. Healthcare providers are subject to a duty of candour which requires them to acknowledge if something has gone wrong with the treatment that has been provided, so it is possible that the reply to complaint confirms that they are likely to accept liability for your claim. This can help to focus the formal legal investigation of your claim. Similarly, if the reply to complaint states that the healthcare provider does not believe that anything went wrong with the treatment that you have received, the reasons that are given can steer the investigation of the claim.
There is no formal time limit to make a complaint via an informal route, but many healthcare provided will refuse to investigate a complaint about treatment provided more than 6-12 months ago. The healthcare provider will take time to investigate the complaint and provide a response, so it is still important to seek independent legal advice on your claim, and in all cases to keep the relevant limitation period for medical negligence claims in mind.
If the treatment in question was provided in a NHS hospital, the hospital trust will be the defendant rather than the individual healthcare professional who treated you. This is because the NHS Indemnity means that all individuals providing NHS treatment are covered by the NHS trust that employs them.
If the claim concerns treatment provided by your GP or dentist, the individual GP/dentist and the GP/dental practice will be the relevant defendants.
Any ongoing or future treatment should not be impacted by your claim.
The healthcare professionals are unlikely to be aware of the claim until much later in the process, and even if they are aware they should not discuss the claim with you.
The first step is to consider any documents and information that you are able to provide about your claim. This will enable us to establish a preliminary view on the prospects of success of your claim and to agree a case plan with you.
We will take a detailed witness statement from you covering the events leading up to the negligence and detailing the impact that the negligence has had on you. The witness statement will be updated as your claim progresses.
We will obtain a full set of your medical records to consider the treatment that you have received, the injuries and losses that you have sustained, and what is being done to treat you. The records will be securely sent to a pagination company who will summarise the records.
We will identify, approach and instruct suitable independent experts to review your medical records and prepare reports dealing with breach of duty of care and causation of avoidable harm. We will ensure that the experts that we approach specialise in the medical issues at the heart of your claim, and we will consult with you over the choice of expert before an instructions are confirmed.
If these reports are supportive of your claim, additional reports dealing with your condition and prognosis and the quantification of financial compensation will be instructed. You may need to attend an examination with the relevant expert(s) for these reports to be finalised.
Once the expert evidence is completed, we will send a Letter of Claim to the defendant in line with the Pre-Action Protocol for the Resolution of Clinical Disputes. This will include a summary of the facts of your claim, the allegations of negligence, details of your injuries and your condition and prognosis, along with an outline of the heads of loss that you wish to claim. The defendant has two weeks to acknowledge receipt of the Letter of Claim, and four months to provide a formal response. The Letter of Response will confirm whether the claim is admitted or denied.
If the defendant admits liability for your claim, it may be possible to negotiate a settlement to bring your claim to a conclusion.
If the defendant denies liability for your claim, or if it is not possible to agree a settlement with the defendant, we may instruct a barrister to provide an opinion on the prospects of success of your claim, the likely valuation and the next steps required to prepare to issue the claim in court.
Every case depends on its own circumstances so it is impossible to provide a definitive timescale to bring a medical negligence claim to a conclusion.
If the defendant admits liability for your claim, it is reasonable to expect the claim to conclude quicker than if the defendant denies liability. Claims involving serious life changing injuries will take longer to investigate than those where the injury is for a shorter duration. Sometimes factors outside of our control can cause delay, for example if a healthcare provider is slow to provide your medical records,
In all cases we will do everything that we can to ensure that your claim is progressed as quickly as possible and we will keep you updated as every stage of your claim.