§ CASE LIBRARY

Real medical negligence cases,
every one linked to the judgment.

Published judgments of the courts of England and Wales, summarised in plain English: what went wrong, what the court decided, and the sum where the judgment states it. We include the claims that failed as well as the ones that succeeded, because they show what you have to prove.

Judgments

44

With the sum stated

13

Claimant succeeded

26

Claim failed

16

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AllSum statedClaimant succeededClaim failed
Every claim typeClinical Negligence (1)Surgical Errors (3)Cerebral Palsy (8)Birth Injuries (1)Misdiagnosis & Delayed Diagnosis (1)Erb's Palsy (1)GP Negligence (4)Maternal Birth Injury (2)Stillbirth & Neonatal Death (1)Neonatal Injury (1)Sepsis Negligence (3)Cauda Equina Syndrome (2)DVT & Blood Clot (1)A&E Negligence (3)Cancer Misdiagnosis & Delayed Diagnosis (1)Orthopaedic Negligence (2)Vascular Negligence (1)Cardiac Negligence (1)Brain & Spinal Surgery Negligence (1)Anaesthetic Negligence (2)Fatal Medical Negligence (4)
Claimant succeeded

HQA v Newcastle-upon-Tyne Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust

[2025] EWHC 2121 (KB)·2025·Liability decided at trial

A 25-year-old with congenital heart disease suffered a severe brain injury when her aorta was cut during a high-risk repeat sternotomy and it took around 24 minutes to get her onto full bypass. The judge found the surgeon should have exposed the femoral vessels in advance (saving around 13 minutes) and that consent was deficient; she would still have gone ahead with the operation, but with that precaution taken.

Surgeons planning a known high-risk operation must take reasonable precautions beforehand and tell the patient about them; a court can find negligence in planning and consent even where the intra-operative error itself was not negligent.

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.

§ HOW TO READ THESE

Most claims never reach a judgment. They settle privately, and settlement sums are confidential. Judgments surface when liability is disputed, when damages are fought over, or when a court must approve a settlement for a child or someone who lacks capacity. That is why approvals and damages trials are where the public figures come from.

Amounts are only what the judgment prints. Where a case shows a lump sum plus periodical payments, the yearly payments continue for life and can be worth far more than the lump sum. Where no figure is shown, the court decided fault but the money was settled or assessed elsewhere.

Plain-English guides built on these cases →

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.