Could poor medical treatment effect my claim?
I had an accident a year ago and my right leg had a couple of nasty fractures. The other driver’s insurer admitted fault early on and has been paying for treatment. The problem is that I was in for some treatment and the hospital messed up an operation and it looks like my recovery is now going to take longer as a result. The other side’s solicitors are saying they are not paying for the impact of the hospital’s mistake and say any ongoing loss is not for them to compensate. Can you give me some advice to pass on to my solicitor as he seems at a loss with how to deal with this?
Ran, Southwark
Answer
Fairly frequently we have cases where a person has an accident during the course of a claim for a previous accident. It is a quite straightforward situation where alleged medical negligence is the second incident.
For medical negligence to count as an “intervening act”, preventing the person responsible for the first accident to pay for the consequences of a second event, then it must be grossly negligent treatment, not merely negligent treatment. An example would be operating on the wrong limb as that is obviously grossly negligent. So the answer in your case will depend on medical expert evidence as to whether or not the treatment received was grossly negligent. If it was not grossly negligent then the driver’s insurer will be responsible for the ongoing issues and losses arising from it.
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