If you are unfortunate enough to suffer an illness or injury as a result of negligent medical treatment, you can make a personal injury claim for compensation. This type of personal injury compensation claim is often referred to as a Clinical Negligence Claim or a Medical Negligence Claim.

With all clinical negligence compensation claims, you would need to prove that your injury or illness was caused as a result of the negligence of the clinical staff treating you. You would need to prove that the care you received or the decisions made in your case fell short of the standard of care reasonably expected of someone practising in that field. You would also need to show that the errors made caused you additional harm or led to a worse outcome than would have occurred with standard and careful treatment. This is because sometimes errors are made which do not in fact lead to a worse outcome.

Once you appoint a personal injury compensation solicitor, they will assist you in compiling your evidence and presenting it to the third party insurers. Every personal injury compensation claim is very different and while some are settled within a matter of months, others take years. Most cases are settled out of Court; however, some will need to progress this far.

Multi Party Actions for Clinical Negligence Claims

In some clinical negligence cases, many people have all been injured due to very similar circumstances. For example if one particular surgeon, dentist, radiologist or pathologist acts consistently negligently over a period of time, many patients could be harmed. Sometimes, too there are longstanding equipment failures at a hospital or clinic that lead to group claims or contaminated supplies of blood products or transplant material that can affect hundreds of patients.

When this happens, the Court may set a deadline for all injured parties to come forward with their personal injury compensation claim and the group of claims are dealt with as a Multi Party Action with special rules and timetables.

It is therefore, very important to seek legal advice as soon as you realise that you have been harmed by the negligence of a medical practitioner. If you do unfortunately, miss the deadline set by the Court, it may still be possible to make your personal injury compensation claim, although this can be more difficult.