Injury Compensation News

Nora Hayes of Midleton, County Cork, has secured a settlement of €250,000 from the Bon Secours Hospital, Cork, following the death of her husband Patrick Hayes due to a kidney operation in November 2004.

The medical negligence claim was denied and the settlement was without admission of liability by the hospital.

Patrick Hayes was in good health prior to an operation to remove a kidney.  A slight ooze from the spleen was noticed during the operation and surgical gauze was applied.  Hayes was admitted to the intensive care unit after the operation and subsequently suffered a massive haemorrhage and died following attempts to resuscitate him.  It was alleged that the nursing staff were aware that Patrick Hayes was having difficulty but failed to react.

A postmortem found a blood clot surrounding the spleen and more than two litres of blood in the peritoneal cavity.

Austin Dowling, aged 59 of Tallaght, County Dublin, has settled a claim for damages with the Adelaide and Meath Hospital, Tallaght.  Like the vast majory of workplace injury claims, the claim was settled before it went to court. The amount of the settlement was not revealed and there was no admission of liability from the hospital.

Austin Dowling is a mortuary porter at the hospital and claimed he hurt his should after lifting a dead man from a hospital bed into a concealment trolley in January 2005.  Dowling claimed he suffered loss of movement and pain in his right shoulder that required surgery.

The claimant alleged negligence and breach of duty by the hospital.  His claims included lack of a safe system of work, failing to provide proper equipment/machinery to lift a body by failing to provide a roller board to slide a body onto a trolley. He also claimed the trolley was unsafe and he had not received specific training for the type of concealment trolley involved.

Lifting injuries are one of the most common workplace injury claims.