This week I was instructed on a new clinical negligence matter.
The facts of the case involved a hospital leaving a 10cm drain lying around in the left side of the groin region for which the patient then required further surgery, under general anaesthetic.
I have been practising clinical negligence for 6 years and the issue of retained products has been a theme that has run throughout my career for example one of my previous cases involved a testicle having to be removed following a retained swab.
I decided last week to do some research into retained products and discovered that since 2004, 283 claims have been made against the NHS trusts after surgical instruments or other foreign bodies were left inside patients following surgery. Implements found inside patients over this period include swabs, catheters and cutting instruments.
The health service has paid over £4 million in compensation for such cases, amounting to almost two affected patients a week.
These claims for lawyers such as myself are rewarding in every sense, in that we would normally obtain an admission from the defendant trust for the client early on and therefore we would only then be left to make a valuation of the claim which means the claim is settled for the client in a short timeframe, pleasing the client.
What I do feel is very sad about these cases is that they can have very tragic consequences which are due to such basic errors. They are mistakes that can be so easily avoided through routine checks such as counting the number of swabs that have been taken out and recording this figure against the number of swabs that were put in.
It is almost certain that there are a lot more incidents like this out there but often patients will not be told and if they are told they decide not to pursue a claim against the hospital.
This is an interesting issue that I am sure I will be dealing with in another 6 years time as MISTAKES HAPPEN.
On a happier note I am off on my annual break, as the weather is now so nice we have decided to holiday In England, going to Newby Bridge in the Lake District for one week and just outside Ludlow for the second week.
I can assure you that I will not be thinking about retained products for the next 2 weeks!!!!