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Negligent Hand Surgery for Dupuytren Contracture Settles out of Court

In this matter we acted for a 64-year-old lady who presented for surgery for a contraction in the fingers of her right hand, having been diagnosed with Dupuytren’s contracture by her GP. The surgery was performed at a public hospital near the border of New South Wales and Victoria.

After the operation, our client’s condition in fact deteriorated. The contraction in her fingers did not improve and she began to have significant pain in the right shoulder. Furthermore, she could not grip or hold things in her right hand, causing her to experience difficulty doing simple tasks like writing, driving, using cutlery or household upkeep. The surgical procedure has also left unsightly scarring and has caused the client to have difficulty sleeping, anxiety and depression.

Upon taking up carriage of the matter, our medical negligence team sought clinical notes from the Hospital and other treating doctors. We investigated the liability of the Hospital by engaging our expert medical practitioners to examine the evidence and comment on whether proper protocol was followed. Our experts confirmed that faulty surgical technique was the cause of the client’s condition and that appropriate post-operative care was not undertaken.  Our client had sustained nerve damage during the surgery. In fact, the surgeon in question had been the subject of an inquiry and disciplinary action by the health practitioners’ Professional Standards Committee not long prior to our client’s surgery.

After we obtained these reports, we filed court proceedings against the hospital for our client’s injuries. We claimed damages on behalf of the client for pain and suffering, ongoing medical consultations with psychologists and general practitioners, and other treatment and diagnostic costs.

We proceeded to Mediation where we had settlement discussions with the solicitors of the hospital. We reached an early and favourable resolution in the case, with the matter settling in the sum of $175,000.00 inclusive of costs.

We are a highly focused and specialised medical negligence compensation 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.

About Us
Gerard Malouf & Partners have provided friendly, experienced legal advice to communities across Australia for over 35 years. Our Personal Injury Lawyers have taken on ten’s of thousands of cases and we are proud to have won billions of dollars for our clients.
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Meet the diverse and dynamic team of compensation lawyers and supporting staff that have made this all happen below. Our multi-lingual team can discuss your claims in Arabic, Assyrian, Turkish, Greek, Italian, French, Serbian, Croatian, Armenian, Mandarin, Hindi, Punjabi or Malayalam.
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Meet the diverse and dynamic team of compensation lawyers and supporting staff that have made this all happen below. Our multi-lingual team can discuss your claims in Arabic, Assyrian, Turkish, Greek, Italian, French, Serbian, Croatian, Armenian, Mandarin, Hindi, Punjabi or Malayalam.

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