Because no two cases are the same, we’d need to know the precise details of your claim before we can tell you how long it will take, but we can give you an idea based on how similar cases have gone.
A lot of medical negligence cases are complex and require thorough investigation and reports from senior doctors, often in different specialities, before it can be shown that there has been a breach of duty and that this has caused some loss.
Proving breach of duty and causation are fundamental to bringing a successful medical negligence case.
How long each stage of a medical negligence claim takes
Initial Investigations
Once you have instructed a specialist medical negligence lawyer they will discuss with you what went wrong in your treatment and how this has affected you. This stage should be completed quite quickly, within a few weeks of you first making contact.
It’s best to use a medical negligence expert, because they’ll be familiar with the claims process, so may be able to move the claim along faster than a lawyer who’s not done that kind of work before.
The next step will be to get copies of all of your medical records, to be reviewed and discussed with you. Hospitals and your GP should provide records within 40 days of a request, but often it takes much longer to get all of the records.
Once the records have been obtained and reviewed it will then be necessary to get the opinion of a senior doctor. This is because to prove a medical negligence case you have to show that the treatment provided fell below the standard of a reasonable body of similarly qualified doctors. The best doctors often have long waiting lists, but it should be possible to complete this stage within 3 – 12 months.
Certainly, we would aim to be in a position to advise a new client if they had a claim worth pursuing within 12 months of first being instructed.
Submitting the Claim to the Defendant
Once there is evidence of an arguable medical negligence case a letter of claim will be prepared and sent to the defendant(s). In medical negligence cases the letter of claim often needs to be very detailed because it has to set out what went wrong, the legal failures and what damage this has caused. It is often necessary to instruct a barrister to help with this stage of the claim, especially in complex cases. It may even be necessary to have a conference with the medical experts and a barrister before the letter of claim can be prepared.
Once the letter of claim has been prepared and sent to the defendant, they then have four months in which to investigate and respond. This may seem like a long time but they will often have to instruct medical experts themselves. They will often ask for extra time to complete their investigations, especially if more than one specialist is required.
This stage should be completed in 6 -12 months
Negotiating a settlement
If the defendant accepts that there was breach of duty and this caused some harm, and they admit liability, this will greatly speed up the rest of the claim. The next stage is for you and your lawyer to collect evidence showing your financial losses. There will be compensation for your injuries and those financial losses which we can prove flow from the negligent treatment. Where liability has been admitted and, if negotiations go smoothly, it should be possible to get an acceptable offer within 3 – 6 months. Once you accept an offer this will bring your claim to an end.
Disputed and complex cases
If the claim is denied by the defendant or is particularly complex, such as a birth injury claim requiring multiple different experts, then the claim can take many years.
If there is a dispute between the medical experts and the trial is required then it will take many years for the case to come to trial. This is because of the time it takes to get all the evidence that is needed and prove the financial losses.
In some cases, such as birth injury cases, you have to wait until the child is a teenager to see how the injury has a long term effect on them.
One additional delay is with the courts and getting dates for preliminary hearings and the trial itself. A lot of courts are very busy and even if the case is ready for trial there may be delays of more than 12 months actually getting a trial date.
It is very hard, indeed, impossible to give an accurate idea of how long a disputed or complex claim will take but it is often more than 3 years.
How you can help your medical negligence claim settle as quickly as possible
Although medical negligence cases can take a long time there are things that you can do to help your legal team. The first one is to keep all receipts and expenses in a safe place. If you make a note each time there is an expense this will make sure that your losses are not missed. It is always much easier to make a note of expenses as they occur rather than trying to think back six months or more than a year and try to remember where you put that receipt.
Summary
It is very difficult to give an accurate indication about how long a medical negligence case takes because a lot depends on the complexity of the claim, gathering the evidence to prove your claim, whether the other side admit liability or dispute it, and if legal proceedings are required, the delays caused by the court system.
However, once investigations show that you have a good claim, the majority get settled, so it is certainly worthwhile instructing an experienced medical negligence lawyer to investigate your claim. Certainly, the earlier you can do this the better. It is always harder to prove cases where the negligent treatment happened a long time ago, especially if the medical records are not detailed and we have to rely on people’s recollections.
If you have a claim that you would like us to investigate, contact our specialist team today.