When medical care goes wrong
Sometimes treatment does not go the way it should, and you are left without a clear answer about why. There are several routes to getting one — sometimes an explanation, sometimes an apology, sometimes a claim — and the first of them cost nothing. This page covers clinical negligence, which you may also have heard called medical negligence; they are the same thing.
You do not have to pay anyone
Every route below is free, and several of them give you the thing people most often say they wanted: an explanation, and confirmation that it will not happen to someone else. They are open to you whether or not you ever speak to us.
- Complain to the NHS — free, and you can complain either to the service itself (the hospital, GP or dental practice) or to the body that commissioned it, though not to both about the same thing. Normally within 12 months of what happened, or of you finding out about it, though that can be extended. In Wales the process is called Putting Things Right.
- Free help to complain — an NHS complaints advocate will help you write the letter and come to meetings with you, at no cost. In England you can find one through your local Healthwatch.
- The Ombudsman — if the reply does not resolve it, the Parliamentary and Health Service Ombudsman (England) or the Public Services Ombudsman for Wales will look at it independently. Free, and no solicitor is needed.
- AvMA — Action against Medical Accidents is a charity with a free helpline specifically for people harmed by medical care, including help getting hold of your medical records.
- Legal aid, for one particular group — it was withdrawn from most clinical negligence in 2013, but it remains available for a child severely disabled by a neurological injury caused in pregnancy, during birth, or in the first weeks of life. If that describes your family, check it before you consider anything paid.
How to complain to the NHS · Ombudsman (England) · Ombudsman (Wales) · AvMA · Check legal aid
A complaint and a claim are different things
A complaint gets you an explanation, sometimes an apology, and sometimes a change to how a service works. It does not pay compensation. A civil claim is the route that can, and it is slower, harder, and needs evidence a complaint does not. Many people want the first and are sold the second.
It matters the other way round too: an apology is not an admission of negligence. Hospitals are expected to tell you when something has gone wrong and to say sorry, and doing so decides nothing about whether anyone was legally at fault. Being told that something went wrong is not the same as being told you have a claim.
What a claim actually has to prove
Two things, separately, and both by expert medical evidence: that the care fell below the standard a competent professional would have provided, and that this is what caused the harm. Both are needed. Treatment can have a bad outcome without anyone being negligent — medicine carries risk that no one is at fault for — and care can be poor without having changed what happened to you.
Time limits, honestly
A claim is normally subject to a three-year limit, running either from when the treatment happened or from when you first knew — or ought reasonably to have known — that your injury might be linked to it. That second date is a legal question decided on your particular facts, not an arithmetic one.
There are significant exceptions. Time does not begin to run against a child until they turn 18, so a claim about a child's care can usually be brought until their 21st birthday. It does not run at all while a person lacks the mental capacity to bring a claim, which can mean no deadline has passed even decades later. Where someone has died, a fresh period generally runs from the death or from when the family knew. Courts also have a discretion to allow a claim brought late.
None of that means you should wait. It means that if you think you are too late, you may not be, and it is worth asking someone qualified rather than assuming.
What we do, and what we do not
RemedyBridge is a claims management company, not a law firm. If you send us the form below, a person reads it and gets in touch to talk it through. We do not decide whether you have a claim, whether you are in time, or what a claim might be worth — those are questions for a specialist solicitor working from your medical records and an independent expert, and anyone answering them from a web form is guessing.
You will not find an estimate of what your case is worth anywhere on this site, and you should be wary of anyone who offers you one before they have read a single record. What using a paid service can cost you.
Ask us to get in touch
A few questions so we know who is calling and what about. Nothing here is a decision about your claim, and nothing is ticked for you.