A midwife who slipped on a wet patch and fell over on a ward at Stevenage’s Lister Hospital has been awarded £112,651 in compensation.
It is one of nine claims settled by the East and North Herts NHS Trust, which runs Lister, in 2016-17.
A patient who tripped in hospital grounds and fractured a hip was awarded £21,858, and a security employee was given £16,500 after tripping on damaged flooring.
A visitor who tripped on an uneven paving slab outside the main entrance to the maternity unit at Lister was awarded £8,364, and a nurse who went to sit on a swivel chair and fell when it moved, sustaining an ankle injury, received £6,349.
A security employee who tripped on uneven carpet and fell to the floor, fracturing his thumb and spraining two fingers, received £8,690, while someone who sustained fractures after tripping on a broken bollard on a footpath in hospital grounds was awarded £8,233.
A clinical support worker was given £4,538 after feeling back pain while moving a patient, and £2,434 was awarded for a needlestick injury in A&E.
Claims which were thrown out include a member of staff tripping over a recycling box in an office area, a ward clerk alleging prolapsed discs from wheeling a large patient from a ward to the smoking area, and a staff member injuring their right shoulder extracting a file from a filing cabinet.
An NHS trust spokesman said: “Under national legislation, NHS staff can lodge claims for compensation if they believe they have been injured at work. Patients and visitors also have a similar right. We will always check the veracity of such claims, reaching agreement to settle where evidence exists to support a claimant’s case. The NHS trust also seeks to use such cases to ensure that measures are taken to prevent similar problems from happening in future.
“Where a claim is settled, the first £10,000 is paid by the NHS trust from budgets held for this purpose. All sums over the first £10,000 of any individual settlement are paid to the claimant via a national NHS scheme.
“In 2016-17, our NHS trust concluded 17 claims – some of which dated back as far as 2011. Of these 17, nearly half – eight – were rejected.
“The settlement payments total for the year was £189,615, of which over £120,000 was paid out via the national scheme.”
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