For every 4 Lottory millionaires, the NHS pays someone £1m in compensation for negligent care
More than 600 people have been granted payouts of £1 million plus in damages for injuries caused by negligent NHS care - meaning that for every four millionaires created by the National Lottery, a fifth person collects a seven figure cheque for having their life ruined by the health service.
The NHS bill for damages to these top-end claimants over the past 14 years now stands at a staggering £1.8 billion.
Negligent NHS Care
A total of 604 patients received medical negligence compensation of £1 million or more through the Clinical Negligence Scheme for NHS Trusts which was set up in 1996.
And by far the most common cause of these huge payouts was negligent care during maternity. In 314 cases, babies were left with cerebral palsy, a form of paralysis caused by brain injury during birth. Obstetrics, which deals with childbirth, has been at fault in a further 343 of the bumper claims. Some of the cases were only settled in 2009 after many years of legal wrangling.
The biggest compensation payout went to ten-year-old Harry Snowdon, who was awarded £7.1 million by a court in October after medical negligence left him with severe brain damage from birth. A four-hour delay in delivering him by caesarean section in 1999 at the John Radcliffe Hospital, Oxford,starved his brain of oxygen.
Freedom of Information requests reveal a further 137 cases of brain damage led to £1 million-plus payouts. There have been 15 needless lower limb amputations and 35 patients were left as either paraplegics, or quadriplegics. Incompetent, negligent or careless hospital treatment left others blind, incontinent, or with nerve and spinal damage.
Health Trusts with worst payouts
- West Hertfordshire (13 cases) - Total: £37 million
- Barking, Havering and Redbridge (13 cases) Total: £28.5 million
- Oxford Radcliffe (12 cases) Total: £38 million
- East Kent (11 cases) Total: £31 million
- Leeds Teaching (9 cases) Total: £26 million
- Royal Free Hampstead (9 cases) Total: £19 million
- Imperial College (8 cases) Total: £33 million
- Pennine Acute (8 cases) Total: £32 million
- City Hospitals Sunderland (8 cases) Total: £28 million
- Central Manchester (8 cases) Total: £23.5 million
If you or someone close to you has suffered as a result of medical negligence and would like to make a claim, contact our specialist medical negligence lawyers to discuss your options. Our lawyers operate on a no win, no fee basis.
Click here to read some of our settled medical negligence cases.
Consistent with our policy when giving comment and advice on a non-specific basis, we cannot assume legal responsibility for the accuracy of any particular statement. In the case of specific problems we recommend that professional advice be sought.
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