5 Things Solicitors Should Know About Stroke Negligence Claims

The more difficult question is often whether earlier recognition, treatment or prevention would probably have changed the patient’s outcome.

Drawing directly from his recent INNEG webinar, Consultant in Stroke Medicine Dr Kayvan Khadjooi, who has worked as a medico-legal expert witness since 2015 and prepared several hundred expert reports, shares five practical issues solicitors should consider when assessing potential stroke negligence claims.

From apparently normal early CT imaging to missed TIAs and failures to reassess stroke risk, the guide highlights where potentially important breach and causation issues can sit within the medical records.

For solicitors, these distinctions can help identify which parts of the chronology warrant closer scrutiny, what questions may need to be put to an expert, and whether an apparent failure would realistically have altered the outcome.

Download The Guide Here >

Dr Khadjooi has worked as a medico-legal expert witness since 2015, providing opinions on breach of duty, causation, condition and prognosis in clinical negligence claims involving stroke. His expert work covers thrombolysis, thrombectomy, TIA, stroke prevention, rehabilitation, atrial fibrillation and stroke in younger patients.

Based on his recent INNEG webinar, this guide brings together five of Dr Khadjooi’s key insights on stroke diagnosis, treatment, causation and prevention.

Inside you’ll learn:

• Why a normal early CT does not necessarily rule out an acute ischaemic stroke.
• Why a low NIHSS score can still represent a disabling injury.
• Why timing can become the central causation issue in delayed-treatment claims.
• Why posterior circulation strokes can be particularly vulnerable to misdiagnosis.
• Why the relevant breach may have occurred days, weeks or even months before the eventual stroke.

A key theme throughout the guide is the importance of looking beyond individual findings in isolation. An apparently normal CT, a low stroke severity score or non-specific symptoms such as dizziness do not necessarily tell the whole story. The patient's history, neurological findings, functional impact and chronology may all materially affect the assessment.

Dr Khadjooi also explains why proving delay alone is not enough in delayed-treatment claims. The expert may need to consider when symptoms began, when the patient presented, what imaging showed, whether treatment was clinically appropriate and whether it could realistically have been delivered early enough to produce a better outcome.

The guide also looks beyond the acute hospital admission. Missed TIAs, failures to prescribe preventative treatment, inadequate monitoring of hypertension and failures to reassess stroke risk in patients with atrial fibrillation can all become relevant when considering whether an eventual stroke might have been prevented.

For solicitors, the guide provides Dr Khadjooi’s perspective on where to look within the records, which clinical details may change the analysis, and how to distinguish a poor outcome from a potentially missed opportunity to diagnose, treat or prevent stroke.