Medical negligence costs hospital £1.2m in compensation

A hospital trust in Yorkshire has paid out a total of almost £1.2 million in compensation after one surgeon's medical negligence left a number of female cancer patients in pain and badly scarred after botched breast surgery.

The Yorkshire Post has reported that a total of £1,189,054 has been distributed by Barnsley Hospital NHS Foundation Trust to 26 women operated on by specialist surgeon Puvaneswary Markandoo, who worked at the hospital until October 2008.

One of the claimants, Anne Bassett, from Jump, Barnsley, told the newspaper how she had ended up "looking worse" after corrective surgery than she had following her initial mastectomy.

"I was put forward for a reconstruction after I had breast cancer in 2004. It was horrific. I ended up having eight or nine operations because they all went wrong. She left me a physical mess and I'm scarred for life," Ms Bassett explained.

Recently, it has been widely suggested that suing the NHS for medical negligence may become too costly for more people in the wake of cuts to both legal aid and lawyers' success fees.