Family win medical negligence compensation
A family have won
medical negligence compensation for their son, who was born with cerebral palsy in 2002. As well as financial compensation, they also received admission of liability from the Gateshead Health NHS Trust Foundation and a full apology from the trust.
During the delivery in 2002, the boy suffered from asphyxiation which led to the birth injuries that caused his cerebral palsy. During the case, it was argued by the family’s lawyer that better care during the birth process could have meant the boy could have been born without any of the complications that arose.
The boy’s parents said in the beginning they did not want to make a clinical negligence claim, but that the problems associated with raising a child with a disability left them with no choice. They remarked: "We were not in favour of pursuing compensation initially, but found the levels of care provided by the state were simply not adequate or inaccessible. The social services care has been variable, to say the least, but there was a period of over a year when we did not even have a social worker assigned to us. It is woefully obvious how under-funded the system can be."
Updated on 15/06/2008