Meningitis Compensation Claims

How do I make a meningitis claim

This is specialist work. It is important that your chosen law firm has the legal expertise and the medical knowledge to understand and appreciate what evidence is required and to interpret that evidence when it is obtained.

Your lawyers must also have relationships with the appropriate medical and other experts who can assess your immediate health needs and suggest what treatments you or your child may urgently require. Their input will be absolutely crucial to your or your child’s recovery and the success of your claim.

We can help you to show that you or your child received sub-standard treatment, initially in a failure or delay in diagnosing meningitis and the impact that may have had on giving you or your child prompt treatment. We must be able to prove that, in all likelihood, you suffered harm as a direct consequence of that sub-standard care.

If you are worried about the treatment that you or your child received you should seek advice from a specialist solicitor straight away. There are time limits to making these claims so it is best if we speak as soon as you are able to after the event so we can best advise you of your options.

If you feel you may have a case, call us for a free initial consultation. Our priority will always be your health and well-being. We can give you the benefit of our experience in such claims as well as an objective assessment of the likely success of your claim.

If I have a meningitis case

Establishing whether you have a case for making a meningitis claim depends on whether our expert lawyers can show that there was a breach of the duty owed to you by the responsible healthcare staff.

We need to prove that doctors failed to appropriately test for meningitis or that their failure to diagnose, misinterpret or delay that diagnosis lead to you not receiving the appropriate treatment. The standard of that proof need only be that 'on the balance of probability' (i.e. greater than 50% likelihood) it was those failures that were directly responsible for the injuries and actual physical harm you or your child suffered.

There are time limits within which you can claim so whatever your circumstances you should contact us as soon as is practicable. We can then give you free initial advice about whether a claim is possible and establish what additional treatments you may require to help you deal with the future, whatever your prognosis.

The value of your claim will depend on the nature and severity of the injury you or your child suffered, whether you or your child recover fully or if there is long term effect on your health and well-being or that of your child. These can be complex, lengthy and demanding cases. The first thing to do is to contact an expert law firm like Shoosmiths which specialises in this sort of work and can advise you if you have a case that is likely to succeed.

More about meningitis claims

Bacterial meningitis is very serious and should be considered a medical emergency. If left untreated, it can infect the blood, causing septicaemia, which can cause widespread injury. It usually affects children under five years of age, particularly babies under the age of one. It can also affect teenagers aged 15 to 19, although any adult of any age may be susceptible.

Viral meningitis can be mistaken for flu. It is also more common in children and more widespread during the summer.

Meningococcal septicaemia also requires urgent diagnosis and treatment. Failure by a medical team to recognise the symptoms may lead to long term complications such as deafness, blindness and limb loss. In some rare cases the infection can also sadly lead to death.

If this disease is recognised and treated promptly life-threatening complications or any serious long-term harm can be completely avoided.

If you or a loved one have been adversely affected because medical professionals did not appropriately diagnose or manage meningitis infection, you may wish to consider making a claim.