GP Negligence Claims

For all of us, our GP’s are the first people we turn to if we are ill or have general concerns about our health. For the majority of the time, we are served to a very high standard by our GP’s, but sometimes our GP’s let us down, with very serious and sometimes fatal complications.

These failings in the standard of care given by our GP’s could give rise to claims for compensation for the harm suffered and financial losses incurred.

By way of illustration, consider the following examples:-

1. The GP who fails to refer a patient who attends his surgery complaining of chest pains, telling the patient that he simply has indigestion and prescribing medication. The GP is wrong; the patient is suffering heart related problems and dies that night from a major heart attack. If only the GP had referred the patient to hospital immediately, the fatal heart attack may have been prevented.
2. The GP who fails to refer a patient was has noticed changes to a mole on the skin, telling the patient there is nothing to worry about. Only after numerous other visits and just to stop the complaints of the patient that her GP is not listening to her, does the GP refer her to a specialist. The referral is too late; the patient has skin cancer and requires radical surgery and a long course of treatment. Earlier treatment may have prevented such major surgery.
3. The GP who fails to refer a patient who is complaining of a breast lump, only after a number of months during which the lump is getting bigger, does the GP eventually make a referral. This lump is breast cancer which has now spread to the bones; the diagnosis is of a terminal illness. Early referral may have meant that the cancer could have been caught before it had spread giving a much more optimistic outlook for the future.
4. The GP who fails to pay attention to a new mother’s concerns about her baby; dismissing them as being the concerns of an over anxious “first time” mum. The mother is right to be concerned; her child has very early signs of meningitis. When mum presents the child at her local hospital, it is too late for the child who dies. Early treatment by the GP may have prevented this death.

Changes in how “out of hours” services are provided by GP’s has also lead to an increasing number of claims for compensation against the providers of these services. The services are often located at some distance from the patient’s homes, resulting in a delay in receiving treatment, which may have fatal consequences.

Pinstripe make it easy for you to claim compensation. All you need to do is complete the simple online form opposite and the experienced and friendly claims team will handle it from there. It’s that easy!