The Team inherited a case where there was already an offer on the table. The client had suffered a catastrophic brain injury following a road traffic accident. The parties had obtained their respective medical evidence and the defendants were making the offer. The offer did not, on the evidence, seem overly unreasonable.
A unique aspect of this case was that after a period of hospitalisation and some rehabilitation at home, the client’s condition seemed to improve but there was then a period of secondary deterioration following this improvement. The client declined physically and mentally and was no longer able to move without considerable help. He had been walking with assistance prior to the deterioration setting in. This seemed to be an area that required investigation. The deterioration had a significant impact on both the client and the family.
Following discussions a different avenue of investigation was undertaken. Two very specialist neurologists were brought on board – one of whom had extensive experience in post-traumatic brain injury rehabilitation medicine while the other was one of the leading international experts in neurological disorders. The defendants of course had their own neurological expert.
Following instruction of the two new experts, the defendant’s expert agreed with the claimant’s expert that the cause of these highly unusual symptoms was directly related to the accident. As a result of that finding the claim was valued at over four times the original offer.