Our office was contacted by a man who had experienced hospital malpractice on 27 February 2014. The client had already retained solicitors in his matter, but Gerard Malouf & Partner’s superior reputation in medical negligence litigation caused him to change his legal representation.
Our client suffered from a septic injury as following the administration of a steroid to alleviate the pain from a calcaneal spur in his heel. An infection grew in the area of the steroid injection site, and our client went into septic shock and required urgent admission to hospital.
Whilst in hospital, our client did was subject to medical negligence when he did not receive appropriate treatment. There was a substantial delay in administering him urgent intravenous antibiotics and, as a consequence, his foot at the site of the injection became necrotic and he required substantial excision of the underside of his foot leaving a large void which required grafting.
In addition to the significant and ongoing problems from our client’s injuries to his foot, our client had also developed psychological injuries.
A senior medical negligence solicitor with over 30 years experience in medical negligence, arranged for our client’s file to be transferred from his previous solicitors seamlessly. Immediately upon its receipt we set to work thoroughly reviewing the complex medical evidence and reports of specialist doctors, and conducting investigations into our client’s finances to correctly quantify his economic loss.
Less than 6 months after receiving instructions from the client in this matter, we were able to settle this matter by way of an Informal Settlement Conference which saved our client the significant costs of proceeding to hearing.
After negotiation between the parties, including the specialist barrister briefed, the matter settled for $500,000.00 inclusive of costs. This was an outstanding result which our client was very pleased with.
We are a highly focused and specialised law firm being small enough to care, yet large enough to have solid financial, medical and expert resources to match the big defendants and insurance firms. Our “no win no fee” arrangements and written guarantee to reduce fees in the unlikely event of a poor result is unmatched in the legal industry Australia-wide.
