Recent figures obtained by Radio Kent show that medical negligence payouts have doubled, over recent years, to £40 million annually, with roughly half of that sum paid out in birth injury/obstetric cases.
This featured as the lead item on Radio Kent news this morning when Nick participated in the discussions, together with Mark Waterstone, Consultant Obstetrician at the Darent Valley Hospital in Dartford.
There was general agreement about the problems that feature heavily in case giving rise to claims including: the misreading of CTG traces; a lack of proper training, with updates; a lack of senior obstetricians readily to hand in emergencies.
Nick spoke about the flawed financial approach to ‘frontline savings’ that can often result in huge payouts further down the line.
He stressed, above all, the human tragedy for our clients in bringing up children with profound disabilities knowing, all the while, that their child would have been entirely healthy but for the unnecessary mistakes made during labour.
Click below to access a recording of the discussions from this morning’s programme.