Law digests: 10 December 2021

Clinical negligence

HTR (acting by his mother and next friend) v Nottingham University Hospitals NHS Trust [2021] EWHC 3228 (QB), [2021] All ER (D) 03 (Dec)

The Queen’s Bench Division ruled that breach of duty had been established, concerning the claimant’s clinical negligence claim. Four days after an antenatal appointment with Dr S at the defendant’s hospital in 2004 (the relevant date), the claimant had been delivered by emergency Caesarean section, having suffered permanent damage from chronic partial hypoxia which had resulted in asymmetric quadriplegic cerebral palsy. The court held that, as the claimant’s mother (LJR) had raised a concern about reduced foetal movement at the clinic on the relevant date, she had established a breach of duty. Further, in circumstances where the hearing in the present case had taken place 17 years to the day after the events in issue, and where LJR had first prepared a statement eight years after the meeting with Dr S, the court held that, notwithstanding that the critical medical note had recorded active foetal movement,