A man from Saughall Massie has been awarded £2million in compensation after hospital staff failed to save the sight in his one working eye. 39-year-old Colin Fortune lost the sight in his right eye in 2001 following a sports accident. However, when doctors failed to monitor and treat his left eye, he was left completely blind. The father-of-four had already undergone an operation at Royal Liverpool Hospital when his remaining sight began to worsen, however it was not enough and the staff at Arrowe Park Hospital failed to save his remaining sight.

A lorry driver has been awarded £225K in compensation after GPs on two separate occasions failed to identify Cauda Equina Syndrome. 54-year-old Martyn Wall injured his back five years ago while repositioning road signs from his lorry. When he attended his GP practice, however, he was told it was muscle strain and was prescribed basic pain killers. Due to the delay in treatment for the Cauda Equina Syndrome – a crippling back condition affecting the nerve roots of the spinal canal – Mr Wall has been left in constant pain and with irreversible nerve damage. 

An NHS trust has been fined after it was discovered that basic errors caused the deaths of four patients. The trust that previously ran Stafford Hospital, Mid Staffordshire NHS Foundation Trust, admitted four charges relating to the deaths of elderly people between 2005 and 2014.  Where the trust was originally fined £500,000 for the “blunders”, the Department of Health has agreed to cover the fine, and additional £35,000 in costs, seeing as the trust is now defunct and has no funds.

A Leicestershire Crown Court judge has praised a man after saving a four-year-old child from a serious dog attack. It was heard that the dog had clamped its jaws on the young girl’s face, so the man wrestled the dog off her and managed to tether it. It was heard that the Staffordshire bull terrier, Bullet, had escaped from its owner’s garden and attacked a few of the children playing in the street.

Queen’s Medical Centre in Nottingham has issued an apology to 90 year-old Margaret Slater after leaving her to lie on a trolley in the Accident and Emergency department on 11 November without food or water for 11 hours.  The dementia patient was taken to the hospital suffering from severe hallucinations and was seen by a nurse upon her arrival.  Three hours later she was seen by a doctor who said that she should be admitted to the hospital, however she was left where she was for a further eight hours before being moved to a ward.

A hospital trust has admitted to errors that resulted in the death of a newborn baby earlier this year. The baby girl died only two days after being born, with an investigation finding that she would have survived had her mother been given a caesarean section sooner. Delilah Hubbard died on 9 March in Leicester Royal Infirmary’s neonatal unit.

Recently released figures have revealed that councils have paid out millions of pounds in injury and compensation claims as a result of poor road and pavement conditions in Herts and Essex. In the last few years alone, thousands of drivers and pedestrians have reported injuries sustained as a result of road defects. Herts County Council (HCC) paid out a total of £1m in three years, where Essex County Council (ECC) paid out £1.4m, with hundreds of claims still unresolved.

The government has been urged to make changes to the way in which veterans are treated when diagnosed with mesothelioma – a cancer caused by asbestos exposure. Armed forces charities, senior military figures and politicians have all stepped forward in a bid to provide better support to veterans who were exposed to asbestos during their time in service, and have contracted mesothelioma as a result. They are demanding that all veterans will receive the same compensation as civilians, arguing that the government is currently breaching the Armed Forces Covenant.

Following an investigation carried out by Care Quality Commission, which uncovered unacceptable practices and abuse of patients, Clitheroe’s Calderstones Hospital, the UK’s only specialist hospital for patients with learning disabilities, will close.  Inspectors from the Care Quality Commission heavily criticised the hospital in December upon completion of a widespread review carried out by them.

A hospital in Redhill has been criticised over delays in the diagnosis of a patient’s breast cancer following a government watchdog investigation. The patient, who remains anonymous, was referred to East Surrey Hospital after finding a lump in her breast. The ombudsman claimed that the hospital carried out both a mammogram and an ultrasound after her referral in the early summer of 2013, but neither tests confirmed breast cancer. After failing to carry out a needle biopsy, her cancer took a total of eight weeks to be diagnosed.

A 24-year-old man from East London has been awarded damages after a car accident left him with life-changing injuries. Jack Mitchell had been studying to become an electrician when he was injured in a crash six years ago. It was heard that Mr Mitchell had been a front seat passenger when the driver, his friend, swerved to avoid a fox in March 2009. His lawyer described the crash as a “horrific collision”.

Despite a recent £2million investment in a psychiatric hospital in York, the hospital has been closed because patients were found to be at ‘serious risk’. The Vale of York Clinical Commissioning Group (CCG) carried out a critical inspection at the Bootham Park estate in 2014, which ordered that serious improvements were made. Despite a £2m spend on improvements, a Care Quality Commission (CQC) inspection earlier this month made some worrying findings and ordered the hospital to be closed and clinical services moved.

A recent Care Quality Commission (CQC) report highlighted some worrying findings after a recent inspection of a Warrington care home found that residents were “at risk of dehydration and malnutrition”. The report noted a number of serious concerns at the care home, including the fact that staff at Birch Court lacked general patient contact skills and were also unable to answer basic healthcare-related questions. It was even found that some patients were being locked in their rooms, and because of failings with regards to the proper use of safeguards, their “human rights were not protected”.

Passionate rugby player David Griffiths was only 16-years-old when he suffered permanent brain damage during a rugby match. The incident left him with severe memory, behavioural and concentration issues, to the extent that he required around-the-clock care. 13 years after the accident, devastated mother Mandy Griffiths has had her voice heard as she fights to see better safety precautions put in place at youth-level rugby.

According to figures obtained through a Freedom of Information request, councils across the country have paid out almost half a million pounds to injured pupils in the last three years. Payouts included £21,845 to a student who suffered a playground injury due to ‘inadequate supervision’, and £13,358 to a pupil who suffered injury after having their foot trapped in a defective door.

A warehouse worker from Plymouth has been awarded more than £500,000 in compensation after falling from a height, causing him to have his leg amputated. 47-year-old Mark Jeffery fell while cleaning out the guttering of his employer’s Plymouth-based premises ten years ago, leaving him with a shattered leg, ankle and foot. Following a total of thirteen operations to recover his leg, eight years later Mr Jeffery was forced to have his lower leg amputated.

An audience member of the production Fuerzabruta has been awarded compensation after the set collapsed mid-production at the Roundhouse in London. Nicholas Mackay-Grant suffered serious injuries to his back and left shoulder when a spinning sail became dislodged and fell onto the audience in January of last year.  He was treated in hospital following the incident, but his lawyer said that he continued to suffer for over a year from his injuries.

A blind man who was accidently tasered when his white walking stick was mistaken for a sword has accepted an out-of-court settlement with Lancashire Police. The man, who remains anonymous by a court order, was involved in the incident in October 2012, and is still greatly affected by the memory of it.

A mother is suing an Italian waterpark after breaking her back on a waterslide while on holiday to grieve her dead son. 45-year-old Karen Mitchener went on holiday with her family to Italy after losing her son five years ago in a car accident aged 18. During their time in east Italy they visited the Acquaparco Verde Azzurro water park in Marche, but the day ended when Ms Mitchener broke her back on one of the slides.

A man from Colchester, Essex has been left blind in one eye after playing with a toy helicopter inside his flat. 26-year-old Phil Shelgrove had been flying the second-hand toy after purchasing it from a friend. When he accidently pressed the wrong button, however, he directed the toy towards his face, allowing one of the blades to slice his left eyeball.