Orthopaedic & spinal injury

Orthopaedic surgeons deal with the whole musculo-skeletal system including bones, muscles and ligaments. Orthopaedic cases often involve errors of x-ray interpretation either by the surgeon or radiologist.

Errors during spinal surgery can give rise to paralysis including tetraplegia.

Our experience is that the NHS routinely denies liability for spinal and orthopaedic errors on the basis that the patient would have experienced a poor outcome in any event due to his or her underlying condition.

We have dealt with cases involving the following errors:

• use of defective artificial hip
• use of the wrong artificial hip
• discharging patient when the hospital microbiologist warned of a risk of spinal meningitis
• failure to diagnose and treat lower limb compartment syndrome
• error of X-ray interpretation
• failure to inform patient that there was an alternative and safer prosthesis available. Instead the surgeon used a device he had invented himself and also failed to discuss with the patient whether he derived any financial benefit from its use
• various failures in post-operative care including monitoring of blood pressure and infection management
• increasing infection risk by unnecessarily giving a steroid injection during arthroscopy.

For further information please contact one of the team. Alternatively please click here to complete a short enquiry form so we can assess your claim.