CONSULTANT orthopaedic surgeons deal with operations and procedures involving the bones and joints. That will include fractures and trauma of the bones as well as reconstructive surgery of the bones and joints. They deal with neck and back injuries involving soft tissue and muscle, as well as ligament injuries and joint reconstruction.
The most common types of fracture they would deal with include those to the clavicle, ribs, scaphoid, humerus, radius, ulna, femur and tibia as well as the small bones of the hands and feet.
Reconstructive surgery involves hip and knee replacements as well as surgery on the ligaments of the knee, ankle, shoulder and hand.
According to the medico-legal website medicalcasenotes.co.uk:
“The most common clinical areas/procedures leading to a claim of clinical negligence are:
- Failure to diagnose a fracture.
- Poor outcome following a fracture.
- Infection following a bone operation or procedure.
- The management of shoulder injuries.
- Missed slipped femoral epiphysis.
- Poor outcome following a hip replacement.
- Disparity in leg length following a hip replacement.
- Poor outcome following a knee operation.”
Last year a paper was published in the Journal of Bone and Joint Surgery by a team led by S Gidwani FRCS, the Hand Surgery Fellow at Princess Alexandra Hospital in Woolloongabba, Queensland. It analysed 130 cases of alleged clinical negligence and received information on the outcome of 97 concluded cases from the relevant solicitors.
According to the authors: “None of those cases proceeded to a court hearing. Overall, 55% of cases were abandoned by the claimants’ solicitors, and the remaining 45% were settled out of court.
“The cases were settled for sums ranging from £4,500 to £2.7m, the median settlement being £45,000. The cases that were settled out of court were usually the result of delay in treatment or diagnosis, or because of substandard surgical technique.”
(Journal of Bone and Joint Surgery - British Volume, Vol 91-B, Issue 2, 151-156, © 2009 by British Editorial Society of Bone and Joint Surgery).