ABSTRACT
Medical negligence costs for the financial year 1990-91 were around £50 million. A recent analysis of the records from within one Health Authority has estimated that the rate of litigation increased from 0.46 to 0.81 closed claims per 1,000 completed consultant episodes. This represents an estimated cost to the NHS of £84 million (not including administrative and in-house legal costs), which is one quarter of 1% of the annual cost of the NHS (Fenn et al, 2000). In March 2000, the National Audit Office (NAO) reported that the outstanding claims against the NHS had a net value of £2.6 billion, with another £1.3 billion of claims waiting to be made. In 1999-2000 alone there were 10,000 new claims (NAO, 2001). In 2001-02, the cost to the NHS of medical negligence claims was £446 million (Chief Medical Officer (CMO), 2003). When considering these costs, it should be borne in mind that ‘Untoward harmful consequences of healthcare are more common than has previously been recognised’, with up to 1 in 10 hospital in-patient admissions resulting ‘in some kind of adverse event’ and almost 1 in 5 patients reporting that they were a ‘victim of a medication error’ within the last two years (CMO, 2003).
