Reaction to shock increase in London NHS payouts

Posted: 19/07/2012

An article in yesterday’s Evening Standard (London NHS blunders bill soars by 25%), reported that compensation payouts for clinical negligence claims against London hospitals reached a record £163 million in 2011/12, an increase of almost 25% on the previous year. At a time when the NHS faces monumental change and financial pressure, the rise is astonishing. Of particular concern, not least to would-be mothers living in London, is that over half of this figure was awarded in respect of maternity cases.

The Evening Standard reports that NHS London attributes the increase to the fact that payouts are becoming larger due to rising treatment costs. Penningtons is concerned, however, that the issue is compounded by a greater number of cases. We fear that there is only scope for further increase given the current climate of staff cutbacks and budget pressures if decisive action is not taken by hospital trusts.

There are some positives to be drawn from this week’s news. Penningtons acknowledge that one element of the increase in payouts reflects a willingness amongst some hospital trusts to concede that negligent mistakes have been made for which compensation is owed. We welcome early and sensible payouts to patients injured by negligent treatment, not least to spare patients the stress of protracted litigation, but also in the interests of legal costs savings.

Time and again, Penningtons encounters hospital trusts which decline to accept early opportunities to make admissions of the failings in their care; defending cases and dragging out litigation before eventually either making or accepting offers to settle. Legal costs easily soar in these cases and yet it is the perceived ‘compensation culture’ amongst claimants and their solicitors that more often than not gets the blame.

Penningtons hopes that with this large bill for payouts comes an increased commitment to learning from mistakes. We would particularly urge London’s hospital trusts to reflect on last year and focus on the underlying issues to increase standards in care and make their hospitals safer.

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