How long after the medical negligence occurred am I eligible to make a claim?

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    How No Win No Fee Works

    With no win no fee agreements (also known as a Conditional Fee Arrangements, or CFAs), there are no upfront legal fees, which means anyone who has been involved in an accident that wasn’t their fault can gain access to justice without any financial risk. Your solicitor only gets a fee if your claim is successful. If your claim isn't successful, you won’t pay your solicitor any legal fees.

    If your case is successful, typically you will pay 25% (including VAT) of your compensation to your solicitor, although they will discuss any fees before starting your case. To ensure your claim is risk free, your solicitor may take out an insurance policy on your behalf. If you terminate the agreement, you may have to pay fees for the time already spent on your claim, or due to: lack of cooperation, misleading your solicitor, missing medical or expert examinations, or not attending court hearings.

    There are some instances where you are not required to use the services of a claims management company, and are able to claim yourself, for free, directly via the relevant ombudsman/compensation scheme. These include:

    - Criminal injuries: The Criminal Injury Compensation Authority (England, Wales, and Scotland) or the Criminal Injury Compensation Scheme (Northern Ireland)

    - Minor road accidents: The Official Injury Claim Portal

    - Accidents involving uninsured drivers: The Motor Insurers' Bureau

    How long after the medical negligence occurred am I eligible to make a claim?

    As with most of the areas around claims of medical negligence, the rules regarding the time during which you are eligible to make a claim can be somewhat complicated. It’s for this reason that, if you feel you may be suffering as a result of medical negligence, the first thing you should do is get in touch with NoWinNoFee.com to discuss your case and receive free impartial advice as to whether you’re in a position to pursue compensation.

    The law sets out specific time limits for medical negligence claims, although there are a few exceptions to these rules. Put simply, a patient has a period of three years from the date upon which they became aware that they’d suffered harm as a result of medical negligence. It should be noted that this doesn’t mean three years from the date of the treatment itself, since in some cases it may be years before the damage which has been done becomes apparent.

    The two main exceptions to this three year rule are if the patient was a child at the time of the injury, in which case there is no time limit, and if the patient was mentally ill at the time, in which case the three years is counted from the time of their recovery from mental illness.

    It should be noted, however, that in exceptional cases the judge may decide to allow a case which doesn’t meet any of these criteria to proceed anyway, which merely underlines the desirability of seeking expert advice before embarking upon a claim for compensation. The obvious conclusion is that if you suspect you may have been the victim of medical negligence then it’s best to look into making a claim at the earliest opportunity.

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