Cosmetic surgery is extremely common these days and not just with the rich and the famous. Many people now turn to the surgeons to achieve the body and face of their dreams. Unfortunately, the outcome can be far from the desired one with cosmetic surgery carrying with it so many inherent risks!
To start I shall briefly explain the regulation in place when it comes to these types of claims. Private clinics offering surgical treatments such as facelifts under the Health and Social Care Act 2008 must be registered with the Care Quality Commission. This ensures that the clinics offering these invasive procedures meet a set of essential requirements of safety and quality. One of the main comforts for Clients is that the Care Quality Commission inspects clinics at least once a year and have the powers to impose fines and simply shut clinics down for non-compliance!
Furthermore, surgical procedures are regulated activities and therefore ensure that only appropriately licensed medical professionals may carry out such procedures and if they are found to be unqualified they are liable for prosecution.
So what does all this regulation mean if your cosmetic procedure has gone wrong? And consequently you have suffered a personal injury?
Surgeons will always owe their patients a duty of care; however one of the biggest hurdles to come across when claiming negligence in this area is something called the Bolam Test. If you are looking to claim for negligence this is something you may hear referred to several times in both phone calls and letters. The Bolam Test means that you as the Claimant must establish that the standard of care provided to you fell below that assessed with reference to other professionals – Simply put “would another set of professionals have done the same thing… Was what was chosen reasonable?” Further to this the case of Bolitho added the extra hurdle that any method has to be based on logic and is defensible.
Therefore, if the professional has undergone a procedure by using one method over another and no other professional will have chosen that, you may be successful in your claim.
Claims for cosmetic surgery can be very difficult and therefore you should always seek the help of a specialist personal injury solicitor to help. Facelifts are an incredibly invasive procedure and when they go wrong the results can be devastating and also extremely painful but physically and psychologically if there is scarring. Therefore, if the procedure has gone wrong because of somebody’s negligence or because the standard of care has fallen below that expected, you may be entitled to claim.
However! – It is important to consider that just because a certain outcome wasn’t achieved this does not mean that you are entitled to claim! This is a big problem with a lot of cases as unless there was an express guarantee of an outcome your claim may be extremely difficult. There are currently new regulations coming into place to forbid surgeons from promising better outcomes therefore removing this potential avenue too!
However, if you do feel you have a genuine claim you wish to discuss – contact us today!
