The Gazette 1958-61

told that a butcher had stabbed himself at work. He went to the shop at once, transferred the man to the cottage hospital, and there examined the wound, which was in the abdomen, with great care and skill. He diagnosed, wrongly, that the wound, though cutting the deep fascia, had not penetrated to the peritoneum, and sent the man home, but told him emphatically to see his own doctor that evening and tell him what had happened. When the man's own doctor, Dr. M, saw him, symptoms of pain and nausea had developed. The man reported that he had been told by the hospital that the wound was " superficial ". Dr. M, thinking that he had been to a general hospital, accepted that report and treated him for dyspepsia. Five days later the man died after operation, and a post-mortem showed a wound in the small intestine. The widow sued Dr. R, alleging negligence on a number of grounds including failure to communicate directly with Dr. M to report what had happened and what had been found. The trial judge dismissed all the charges of negligence save that in respect of failure to communicate. On that he awarded the widow agreed damages of £9,050. Dr. R appealed. Morris, L.J., for dismissing the appeal, said that Dr. R had said that he could not have put into a letter anything that the patient could not tell his own doctor or which his own doctor could not infer from Dr. R's actions. Yet the melancholy fact remained that Dr. M, who was in no way criticised, was led to think that he need not concern himself with the wound. If he had received a communi cation, he would have been made aware of facts not within his knowledge. The question whether the omission was negligent was one on which expert technical guidance was not needed. Medical witnesses had in this special case stated that if similarly placed their conduct would have been no different from that under review. But the duty still remained with the court to decide whether such conduct amounted in law to negligence, and his Lordship could not on the evidence say that the judge's conclusion that negligence was here established was faulty. Romer, L.J., for allowing the appeal, said that all that Dr. R did was consistent with and founded on his diagnosis—which later proved wrong—that the peritoneum had not been penetrated. His Lordship was not prepared to hold that any action or conduct of Dr. R on that day, which two distinguished witnesses had regarded as being in every respect reasonable, constituted profes sional negligence. He knew of no case in which a medical man had been held guilty of negligence when eminent members of his own profession had expressed on oath their approval of what

and Mr. Justice Edmund Davies held that evidence that a car had left the road and had mounted a grass verge on its rearside and collided with a telegraph ^pole some three feet from the edge of the road 'disclosed a prima facie case of driving without due care and attention. The Court allowed this appeal by the prosecutor, Mr. Watts, from a decision of Essex justices sitting at Clacton, who dismissed an information preferred against Mr. Carter that he had, on February 13, 1959, driven a motor vehicle on the Colchester Road without due care and attention. The justices had upheld a submission made on behalf of Mr. Carter at the close of the prosecution's evidence that he had no case to answer. They had awarded Mr. Carter seven guineas costs. Mr. Michael Odgen appeared for Mr. Watts. Mr. Carter did not appear and was not represented. The Lord Chief Justice asked who had repre sented Mr. Carter before the justices. Mr. Ogden said that he had been represented by a solicitor. The Lord Chief Justice—He must have been very persuasive. The Lord Chief Justice said that this was a perfectly plain instance where the prosecution had adduced evidence to support a prima facie case of driving without due care and attention. It might well be asked what Mr. Carter's car had been doing off the road and in collision with a telegraph pole. A bad point had been taken before the justices and they had been persuaded to accept it. The matter had now come before this court and additional costs had been incurred. The case must be sent back to the justices. (Watts v. Carter, The Times, October 22, 1959.) Public confidence in solicitors. The Queen's Bench Division in England affirmed an order of the Disciplinary Committee striking off a solicitor who had (inter alia) committed breaches • of the Solicitors' Accounts Regulations even al though in the result no client had suffered a,ny loss. There had at one stage been a deficiency in the client's bank account which had been replaced. The Court stated that this was no answer because public confidence in the profession would be shaken by such behaviour. (In Re a Solicitor, 103 S.J. 875. 29 October, 1959). This decision was affirmed by the Court of Appeal on January n, 1960. Professional negligence. Principles applicable. A medical practitioner, Dr. R, while visiting a cottage hospital with no resident medical staff, was