Guildford Medical Negligence Solicitors – No Win No Fee Claims Lawyers Guide

Medical negligence Guildford

Medical negligence Guildford

Finding the right medical negligence lawyer should not be underestimated. Not all personal injury lawyers will have experience in medical negligence cases. Finding the right medical negligence solicitor is crucial as it might mean the difference between being awarded compensation, being awarded the correct level of compensation or not succeeding at all.  If you’re looking for medical negligence solicitors in Guildford, then this guide will provide you with information on what to look for and other options available to you.

For instance, our panel of medical negligence solicitors can cover the Guildford area, so they could help you.  To discuss this with us today, call 0800 652 3087.

To find out more before beginning a claim, please continue reading this handy guide.

Choose A Section

How You Could Choose A Medical Claims Solicitor

Popular methods used when choosing a medical negligence solicitor are asking friends and family for recommendations and reading reviews.  Both are fine and are good starting points.  In this guide we’ll provide information on what you need to look  for when choosing clinical and medical negligence solicitors.

To be able to begin medical claims, a personal injury solicitor will usually want to determine that:

  • You suffered an injury, were made ill or had your existing condition made worse caused by substandard treatment.
  • And that the negligent treatment was carried out by a medical professional who owed you a duty of care.

Once the solicitor is happy that the above is true, they are likely to offer you a no win no fee service.

Medical law firms require a fair bit of time to build a case because they sometimes require complex medical reports to support the claim.  There is a 3-year medical negligence claims time limit for all claims which means you should contact a personal injury lawyer as soon as you find out about the negligence if you want ti pursue a claim. There are exceptions please call our advisors for more information. Leaving it too late may not leave enough time for the solicitor to gather all of the evidence required.

Do I Have To Choose A Solicitor Near Me?

Many people look for medical negligence solicitors in their area, but this could be narrowing the field too much and mean they don’t get the best solicitor for their case.

You don’t have to use a local solicitor as you won’t need to visit their office.  It’s much better to choose one who specialises in medical negligence cases and has years of experience dealing with cases that are similar to your own.

Our panel of expert medical negligence solicitors can cover the Guildford area and specialise in almost all areas of medical negligence so maybe have the knowledge, competence and ability to help you.

We Have A Panel Of Doctors In Guildford To Assess Your Injuries

To ensure you don’t have to travel too far during your claim, our panel of medical specialists can refer you to medical experts in the Guildford area so that you can undergo a medical assessment to support your claim.  Here are a sample of the specialists in your area:

Richard Fotiadis
Guildford Physiotherapy & Sports Clinic,
85 Epsom Road,
Guildford, GU1 3PA.

Syed Zaidi
Ward Street,
Guildford, GU1 4LH.

Tariq Ayyoub
Regus Guildford,
1 Farnham Road,
Guildford, GU2 4RG.

Should I Trust Reviews Of Medical Law Firms?

Medical negligence solicitor reviews can be really useful when trying to narrow down which solicitor to use.  When searching for clinical negligence solicitors in Guildford you could use reviews to help you find out whether previous clients were happy with the frequency of updates and the amount of compensation they received.

We’d still recommend though that you give each solicitor a call to discuss what they will do to support you during the claim and to ask for examples of cases similar to yours that they’ve taken on recently.

Are There Different Types Of Clinical Negligence Claims?

To help you understand what could be deemed a negligent act, we’re going to provide some common examples over the next few sections.  If you don’t see your type of negligence listed, don’t worry, we could still help.  Please call us to discuss your case.

Surgeon Errors And Negligence

Prior to surgery, a patient will often be told about the risks of the operation and be asked to sign a consent form. You might think that covers the surgeon for any mistakes but, in fact, a claim could still be possible if a patient is negligently injured during surgery and it was caused by an avoidable mistake, an error, or deviating from proven procedures.

Some possible examples include:

  • Perforation of internal healthy organs.
  • If surgery is performed on the wrong part of the body.
  • If the patient wakes up or suffers pain during surgery because of an anaesthetic error.
  • Any pain or suffering that is inflicted on the patient because items of surgical equipment were left inside them.

Birth Injury Claims

Staff in maternity wards, including doctors, midwives, nurses and paediatricians all have a duty of care to protect a mother and baby while they’re in the hospital.  This means they should follow all of health and safety procedures and policies to ensure the safety of mother and child.  This means they should be able to deal with normal deliveries and also make amendments if things begin to go wrong.

If they fail to spot a problem though or make poor decisions if a problem happens, it could mean that either mother or baby or even both could suffer unnecessarily. Injuries that could happen during child birth could have devastating consequences as in worst case scenarios the child may have life long injuries that shortens their span of life and reduces their quality of life. If you have any questions at all about injuries you or your child may have suffered during the birthing process do not hesitate to give our advisors a call for any additional information you may need.

Mistakes And Negligence By A Dentist

If a dentist makes a mistakes another dentist of the same ability would not have made in the same scenario it may be enough for a medical negligence solicitor to file a claim for damages if it caused the patient to be injured unnecessarily. Dentists, hygienists and dental nurses all have a duty of care to ensure the patient is treated in a safe environment and where possible the patient is not harmed unnecessarily.

Examples of dental negligence could include:

  • If a patient’s healthy teeth are damaged during a dental procedure due to substandard treatment this maybe classed as dental negligence.
  • If the patient suffers pain during a procedure because the anaesthetic levels were not correct.
  • If an infection takes hold of the teeth or gums because of ineffective hygiene procedures.
  • Or when the patient undergoes a procedure which wasn’t necessary due ti misdiagnosis.

If you think you’ve been negligently injured while undergoing dental treatment, pleas speak with one of our specialist advisors to discuss your options.

Claims Against The Royal Surrey And Other Hospitals

There is no denying that each and every single day hospitals do an amazing job, it is fair to say we need the services hospitals provide. With people living older and older, new medication and treatment options available the health care system is often pushed to its limits and health care practitioners cannot perform they way they would like to. Hospital negligence could happen either at an NHS hospital or a private run hospital if standards are allowed to fall below the expected level.

Examples of negligence in a hospital environment could possibly include:

  • A late or misdiagnosis of a condition which leads you to suffer more than you need to due to the lack of treatment.
  • Injury suffered due to surgical negligence.
  • If you become ill and suffer because you contract a superbug like MRSA due to poor hygiene procedures.
  • Medication errors; being given the wrong dosage, the wrong medication, suffering an allergic reaction and becoming unnecessarily ill as a consequence.

Care Home / Nursing Home Claims

It can be really hard to place a loved one into a nursing home.  You might not have a choice, and you really have to trust that the staff will do their best to look after and care for your loved one.  Regulations, safety procedures and health & safety policies are all outlined by the Health and Safety Executive and staff in care homes should receive full training on their responsibilities.

If nursing home or care home staff fail to meet their obligations, and a patient suffers, then you might be able to make a claim on their behalf if they’re not able to do so themselves.

Examples of negligence that a care homes lawyer could help with could include:

  • Pressure sores (also known as bed sores) because the patient was left in the same position for too long.
  • Illnesses caused by medication not being dispensed at the correct intervals.
  • Injuries caused by falls due to incorrect moving or lifting procedures being attempted by untrained staff.
  • Any form of suffering caused by care home abuse.

If you or a loved one have been a victim of a care home preventable injury, please discuss making a claim with our team today.

Cancer Treatment Mistakes And Misdiagnosis

With the advancement of recent cancer treatment techniques, many cancers are now highly treatable if they are spotted early enough.  Doctors, nurses and cancer specialists are trained to spot cancer as early as possible so that treatment can start as soon as possible.

If a misdiagnosis occurs though, or the cancer is spotted but after many trips to the doctor, and the patient suffers more than they needed to because their treatment was delayed, then it might be possible to claim compensation for any further suffering caused.

For instance, a cancer might be highly treatable while it is at stage 1 and the symptoms might not be too serious for the patient but, if the cancer advances to stage 2, 3 or 4 because of a delay in diagnosis then the patients symptoms might worsen or they might have to undergo more painful treatment because of the delay. In order to claim for damages it must be proven that the delay happened due to negligence not all delays in diagnosis will be the result of substandard treatment.

General Practitioner Claims

GPs are undoubtedly the quickest way to receive a diagnosis for many patients.  Even with the negative press about waiting times, doctors still see many patients every week and often diagnose the problem, provide a treatment plan or refer the patient to specialists within the first appointment.

As the patient will often trust exactly what the doctors says, if the doctor fails to diagnose the correct illness, maybe they misdiagnose it for something completely different it may mean the patient suffers unnecessarily due to the current condition not being treated and any side affects they face from taking medication they do not need.

Here are some examples of how a GP might be deemed negligent:

  • If they fail to spot a problem until the patient has visited the surgery on multiple occasions meaning they suffered because of the lack of treatment.
  • Or if the doctor thinks the condition is something else and doesn’t provide any treatment for the current condition leading to the patient’s symptoms worsening and further unnecessary suffering.
  • If the patient becomes ill because they’ve been given the wrong prescription medicine, the incorrect dosage or have been prescribed a medicine which is a known allergen for them.

Royal Surrey Hospital NHS Trust Claims Data

In the table below, we’ve listed the number of claims made against the NHS trust which covers Guildford and include the amount of compensation paid out between 2017 and 2018 (source).

Healthcare ProviderClaims in 2017/2018Number of Incidents 2017/2018Damages Payments
Royal Surrey County Hospital NHS Foundation Trust (The)35*£9,104,533

If you’d like to discuss Royal Surrey County Hospital personal injury claims with a specialist advisor, please give us a call today.

Hospitals In Guildford & Surrey

To help you further, we’ve listed some of the largest hospitals in the Guildford area:

  • Royal Surrey County Hospital.
  • St Peter’s Hospital Weybridge.
  • Epsom General.
  • Guildford Community Mental Health Services.
  • BMI Alvernia Hospital.

Our panel of medical negligence solicitors can cover the Guildford area which means they could help you to start your claim today.

No Win No Fee Clinical & Medical Negligence Claims In Guildford

Using a no win no fee solicitors service could be safest way to make medical claims because:

  • There’s nothing to pay up front.
  • If the solicitor fails to win the case, meaning you don’t receive any compensation, then you won’t have to pay the solicitor at all.
  • And if the case is won, you don’t need to find the money to pay the solicitor, as it’s taken straight from your compensation.

Our panel of expert medical negligence solicitors all offer a no win no fee service for every claim they take on.

Contact Our Team

If you’re ready to discuss making a personal injury claim today, then you can contact us by calling 0800 652 3087.  One of our specialist advisors will guide you through the process.  If you prefer, you could fill in this online form to begin your claim.

References And Resources

Here are some resources that we think you may find useful:

Royal Surrey County Hospital
Egerton Road,
Guildford, GU2 7XX.

Web: https://www.royalsurrey.nhs.uk

Care Homes In Surrey – a list of care home services in the Surrey area.

GP Indemnity – Information on the government’s clinical negligence scheme for general practitioner claims.

Misdiagnosis Claims – We have mentioned this briefly, but this guide covers when you could claim compensation for a misdiagnosis.

Surgical Negligence Claims – A more thorough look at the types of surgical negligence which can lead to a claim.

Edited by LisM.