It seems South Africa is not alone in struggling with rising medical negligence claims. The British NHS spent £2.7bn settling medical negligence claims for poor care last year – with 41% of the bill, or roughly £1.1b, made up of maternity care claims, and up from an already high 37%.
The latest figure from the NHS is nearly 10% more than the previous 12 months, reports the Daily Mail.
One family, whose baby suffered a massive brain injury during birth, is seeking a seven-figure payout to cover the 24/7 care their child now needs.
Of the 10 062 new claims made last year, 13% were specifically birth-related. The other most common areas were emergency medicine, orthopaedic surgery and general surgery, according to the report from NHS Resolution.
The NHS paid £490.9m to claimants’ lawyers last year, with a further £158.8m on their own legal costs. In some cases, the NHS paid almost as much in legal costs as in damages.
Dr Kim Thomas, chief executive of the Birth Trauma Association, which supports parents who have experienced traumatic births, said: “The same mistakes are being made over and over again. There’s a culture of cover-up (and) blame and not learning from mistakes. It’s unbelievably distressing for families.”
Suzanne White, head of clinical negligence at Leigh Day, which represents thousands of families said: “Things are steadily getting worse. There are midwives saying they are worried about going into work because there aren’t enough of them.”
It was revealed last year that more than 200 babies and nine mothers died due to poor care at the Shrewsbury and Telford NHS Trust. And now 1 700 cases of harm are being investigated at Nottingham University NHS Trust.
Midwife blunder
In one tragic case, a baby died in his mother’s womb two weeks before he was due to be born, after the midwife missed the signs that he had stopped growing.
The NHS Trust admitted liability but the parents still faced a three-year fight for compensation, and saying a scan “would have spotted he was nowhere near the weight plotted” and he would probably have been delivered early “and had a high chance of living”.
In South Africa, the Eastern Cape alone had medico-legal claims of more than R20bn in 2019, many of which were related to cerebral palsy cases.
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See more from MedicalBrief archives:
NHS compensation claims bill escalates, but more cases resolved outside court
Public sympathy for NHS is ‘deterring’ negligence claims
NHS maternity scandal now expected to exceed 1 500 cases
Legal fee capping for medical negligence claims – UK government
Northern Cape sitting with R2.1bn medico-legal claims
'Fraudulent' medico-legal claims hobble Eastern Cape Health