In addition, in the last financial year, the Trust paid out almost £13 million in costs to plaintiffs in negligence cases. The pay-outs from the Western Trust represent more than a quarter of the £50.4 million in payments paid to plaintiffs across Northern Ireland last year.
In a Department of Health report on Clinical and Social Care Negligence cases for the past financial year, of the 582 cases of alleged negligence cases that were open against the Western Health and Social Care Trust, five of them related to alleged abuse of a sexual nature.
No health care system can be guaranteed to be risk or error free, the Trust said. “The Trust takes the health and safety of our patients, clients and staff very seriously, yet this is set against the context where no health and social care system can ever guarantee to be risk or error free. However, the Trust proactively rather than reactively manages such risk and takes appropriate action to ensure lessons are learnt following investigation of such cases, working closely with staff to address safety issues should they need to be addressed. The Trust continues to makes every effort to ensure the highest standards of care are provided to our patients and clients,” a spokesperson said.
Asked about whether the settings for these sexual abuse allegations were in hospital or community, the spokesperson added: “For confidentiality reasons the Trust cannot comment on individual cases and will not be commenting further.”
The Western Trust was also dealing with claims relating to allegations of 30 cases of birth defects, eight cases of a foreign body left in situ in an operation and 116 cases of inappropriate treatment.
The Trust’s negligence costs at £12.9 million are the second highest in Northern Ireland, less than a million under the payments made by the Belfast Trust, which paid the highest amount in negligence costs at £13.7 million.
The largest total at £4.1 million of Western Trust payments was for complaints which arose out of allegations about operations, which can relate to complaints about treatment such as intra-operative problems and operator error. This total includes £3.3 million paid in damages, £233,876 in defence costs and £525,199 in plaintiff costs.
Complaints relating to pregnancy and childbirth -- which can include issues such as birth defects and failure to monitor at first stage labour -- resulted in £2.9 million in payments. These included £2.2 million in damages paid, £248,410 in defence costs paid and £380,435 in plaintiff costs paid.
In the last year, the majority of negligence allegations received by the Trust have related to treatment. 182 cases were open in relation to complaints arising out of allegations of failure to treat or delay in treatment (34), inappropriate treatment (116) and fail to recognise complication of treatment (25).
The number of alleged negligence cases being dealt with by the Western Trust is on the rise. In 2010/11, 500 cases were open. In 2012/13, it was 582, an increase of 16.4 per cent, the second highest increase in the five current Trusts. As for those open in 2012/13, at 582 the number of cases in the Western Trust is the second highest in Northern Ireland, coming behind Belfast Trust at 1,158.
Of those 582 cases, 482 were open, 33 were settled and 125 were closed as at March 31 this year.
Of the 125 that were closed, 40 were closed without payment, while 85 were closed with payment.
Since 2010/11 the Western Trust has reported the largest increase in the number of negligence cases settled at March 31, 2013 from 1 to 33 in 2012/13.
In the same period, the Western Trust reported the largest increase in the number of negligence cases closed at March 31, 2013 from 85 in 2010/11 to 125 in 2012/13.
As for new cases opened in the Western Trust, in 2010/11, it was 75, in 2011/12, it was 85 and in 2012/13, it was 70.
The Trust pays claims through central funding from the Department of Health. “The Trust has robust procedures in place to manage cases. The £12.9 million referred to is the total payments to date for all clinical/social care negligence cases open during 2012/13. However, it should be noted that costs associated with a case may not be paid out in the same financial year in which the case has been received and therefore the information refers to the amount paid on each case up to and including 31 March 2013.”
The Trust was asked to comment on the increase in the number of alleged negligence cases to the Trust over three years. A spokesperson said: “It should be noted that the figures provided within the DHSSPSNI report detail the number of clinical/social care negligence cases which were open at any stage during each of the last three years, and if a case was open in each of the last three years it will be counted in each year. The figure of 582 includes any claims that remained open as at 31 March 2013, plus any that had been settled or closed for any other reason during 2012/13.
“Claims may remain open for a number of reasons, the main reasons are on-going investigations (either by the Trust or the plaintiff) or the plaintiff has not progressed their claim, but has not notified the Trust or its legal advisers of their decision. In some cases, this will result in the claim becoming “statute barred” or the claim is listed for Hearing at a future date. The Trust currently has claims listed for Hearing up to December 2014. Open claims are regularly reviewed by the Trust and its legal advisers. The number of unresolved medical negligence/professional negligence claims, as at 2 December 2013, is 408.”
This article is courtesy from the Impartial Reporter.
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