§ PUBLISHED JUDGMENT · 2022

Phoebe Charmaine Pickering v Cambridge University Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust

[2022] EWHC 1171 (QB)·High Court (Queen's Bench Division)·17 May 2022

Ms Pickering, who had atrial fibrillation, attended A&E with a cold, white leg; doctors diagnosed a resolved ischaemic event and sent her home on aspirin without heparin or a warning about her stroke risk. She had a major stroke 67 hours later, and the court found that anticoagulation would have prevented it.

Outcome

Claimant succeeded

Sum stated in judgment

Not stated

Claim type

A&E Negligence

Decided

Liability decided at trial

G
ClaimGavel Assistant
● Online · A&E Negligence · free & confidential
FREE
TELL US WHAT HAPPENED — TYPE HERE

Start typing — your likely claim, value and time limit appear here.

Describe what happened (a sentence or two) to begin.

Free · confidential · not legal adviceEngland

§ WHAT HAPPENED

The facts, in brief.

Defendant: Cambridge University Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust (Addenbrooke's Hospital) · this trust’s claims data

Injury: Massive left middle cerebral artery stroke with serious brain damage, expressive and receptive dysphasia and limb weakness

Specialty: Emergency medicine / stroke and vascular medicine · England

§ WHAT THE COURT SAID

In the judgment’s own words.

“Anti-coagulation with Heparin instituted on 25 September would have prevented further clot propagation in the left atrium”

The money

Liability and causation judgment only; breach of duty was admitted by the defendant on day one of trial and damages are to be assessed separately.

§ WHY IT MATTERS

What this case shows.

A transient blockage in a limb can signal a clot from the heart, and discharging such a patient without anticoagulation or advice was admitted to be negligent. The case turned on causation, with the court accepting expert evidence that heparin would have stopped the clot progressing.

About a&e negligence claims →

§ MORE A&E NEGLIGENCE JUDGMENTS

Mixed outcome

Arksey v Cambridge University Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust

[2019] EWHC 1276 (QB)·2019·Liability decided at trial

Mrs Arksey attended Addenbrooke's with a warning bleed from a brain aneurysm but was discharged without a CT scan and suffered a catastrophic re-bleed the next day. The court held she had not proved that admitting her would have avoided the re-bleed, though she succeeded on an admitted delay in fitting a shunt for hydrocephalus.

Proving breach of duty in A&E is only half the battle; the claimant must also show that the correct treatment would have prevented the injury in time, which failed here for the main allegation.

Claimant succeeded

Darnley v Croydon Health Services NHS Trust

[2018] UKSC 50·2018·Appeal decision

A man with a head injury was told by an A&E receptionist he would wait four to five hours, left after 19 minutes, and collapsed at home with a brain bleed. The Supreme Court held the hospital owed him a duty not to give misleading information about waiting times and that his leaving did not break the chain of causation.

An NHS trust's duty of care in A&E starts at the reception desk, and wrong information given by non-clinical staff can found a negligence claim.

All a&e negligence judgments →

Contains information licensed under the Open Justice - Licence v2.0. Judgments from Find Case Law, The National Archives. Summaries are ours; amounts only where printed in the judgment.

This guide is general information about the law in England and Wales, not legal advice about your case. ClaimGavel is run by Costart Projects Ltd on behalf of Tomlin & Partners, a specialist medical negligence firm regulated by the SRA. The free assessment on this page is an AI overview to show you roughly where you stand; a solicitor confirms the position in a free, no-obligation conversation.