Extracting Informed Consent

Extracting Informed Consent Matthew Leitch Winterbotham v Shahrak [2024] EWHC 2633 (KB) Background In Winterbotham, the Claimant had suffered a partially erupted wisdom tooth for many years, which had caused several episodes of pericoronitis (inflammation of the surrounding gum tissue) with associated pain and discomfort. Because of the lengthy wait…

Reasonable Alternative Treatments

Reasonable Alternative Treatments Jeremy Hyam KC Bilal v St Georges University Hospital NHS Foundation Trust [2023] EWCA Civ 605 This Court of Appeal decision was given on 13 June 2023 (after the oral hearing in McCulloch and others v Forth Valley Health Board [2023] UKSC 26 [see pages 9-11 of…

Tragic Death of Newborn from Infection was not due to Negligence

Tragic Death of Newborn from Infection was not due to Negligence Judith Rogerson Callaghan v South Tees Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust [2023] EWHC 1199 (KB) Background  This case arose from the death of the Claimant’s daughter, Imogen, who died from Group B Streptococcus (“GBS”) bacterial meningitis and septicaemia when she…

Departing from Guidelines and Balancing of Risks in Different Medical Settings

Mrs Marion O'Brien (Administratrix of the Estate of Mr John Berry (Deceased)) v Guy's & St Thomas' NHS Trust [2022] EWHC 2735 (KB) At [99] HHJ Tindal (sitting as a Judge of the High Court) summarises aptly that “this case turns not on debates about causation – or indeed the…

Cancer and Contributory Negligence: Who is the Objectively Reasonable Patient?

Otu v Vivek Datta [2022] EWHC 2388 (KB) When will a patient be partly at fault for not following up when their doctor negligently fails to arrange an appointment? That was the question asked of the High Court in Otu v Datta, a case concerning the death of the Claimant’s…

Stroke prevention

Watson v Lancashire Teaching Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust [2022] EWHC 148 (QB) Pickering v Cambridge University Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust [2022] EWHC 1171 (QB) Both of these cases were stroke cases involving issues of causation. Both were decided by Mr Justice Andrew Ritchie. General As those with experience of stroke…

Determining Causation in a Bacterial Meningitis Case

Davies v Frimley Health NHS Foundation Trust [2021] EWHC 169 (QB) This was a claim brought by the widower of a woman who died of bacterial meningitis. She had been admitted to hospital two days earlier with a history of severe headache and middle ear infection. The Defendant admitted that…

Testing the Boundaries of Causation in Mesothelioma Deaths

Wandsworth BC v HMC for Inner West London [2021] EWHC 801 (Admin) Mesothelioma deaths arising from asbestos regularly come before coroners. This case, though, is of particular interest because it tests the boundaries of causation in relation to mesothelioma deaths – what evidence is needed to show that asbestos exposure led…

Cauda Equina and Causation

Hewes v West Hertfordshire Acute Hospitals NHS Trust and 2 Others [2020] EWCA Civ 1523 The Court of Appeal dismissed a challenge to a first instance decision of the High Court that two NHS Trusts and an out-of-hours GP were not liable to the Claimant for alleged failings in the…

Monitoring During Labour

NKX v Barts Health NHS Trust [2020] EWHC 839 (QB)  This article originally appeared in Issue 6 (September 2020). The Facts  This was a liability only hearing where the Claimant alleged that his mother was given insufficient warning that she should have continuous fetal monitoring (“CFM”) when she was in…