Hospital Patients’ Rights And Responsibilities

When you’re in hospital as a patient, you have certain responsibilities. There are a number of things you can do to help yourselves and others, including giving accurate information about your own health and treating staff with respect. Furthermore, you have legal rights which must be upheld. This guide focuses on hospital patients’ rights and explores action you could take if care falling below the expected standard causes unnecessary pain and suffering.

Read through the guide to learn more about the rights and responsibilities afforded to people under public health care or under the care of a private healthcare provider.

We also discuss who you could contact to make a complaint about care you’ve received while in hospital. The guide concludes with a summary of why many people make medical negligence claims with the help of one of our expert medical negligence solicitors on a No Win No Fee basis.

You can get plenty of relevant information by speaking to one of our advisors. Furthermore, you can find out if you have the right to seek compensation for avoidable harm you’ve suffered because of substandard medical treatment:

  • Phone, by calling 0800 073 8801.
  • Going online to contact us and share details.
  • Our live chat feature, which you can see at the bottom of your screen.

A darkened hospital ward.

 

Select A Section

  1. Hospital Patients’ Rights And Responsibilities
  2. What Are Your Rights As An NHS Hospital Patient?
  3. What Are Your Rights As A Private Hospital Patient?
  4. How To Complain About A Hospital
  5. How A No Win No Fee Solicitor Could Help You Claim For Medical Negligence
  6. Further Resources On Hospital Patients’ Rights

Hospital Patients’ Rights And Responsibilities

Health care services in the UK can be split into two broad groups. Firstly, there are public health services, fronted by the NHS, which sees around 45,000 people visit hospital A&E departments every day in England alone. The other group is made up of private healthcare services which provide treatment for a fee.

Whether you receive free hospital treatment or pay for your care, you are owed a legal duty of care by any medical professional who looks after you. Among hospital patients’ rights is the expectation that medical professionals will give the correct standard of care, which is what forms their duty of care.

While patient rights will largely be the same wherever you go, there can be some slight differences between public and private health services.

Before we go into this in more detail, it is worth considering whether care you received met the correct standard. If it didn’t, and it led to you suffering pain that could have been avoided through competent treatment, you could call the number above today to learn if it is possible to make a medical negligence compensation claim.

What Are Your Rights As An NHS Hospital Patient?

The National Health Service (NHS) has been providing UK patients with publicly funded healthcare since 1948. During that time, it has established a clear set of guiding principles that enshrine hospital patients’ rights and responsibilities.

Depending on where you are in the UK, these rights might be protected by legislation such as the Patient Rights (Scotland) Act 2011, or a non-legislative constitution like the NHS Constitution for England. NHS bodies must uphold their responsibilities to patients at all times.

Among your entitlements as an NHS patient under the NHS Constitution are the right to:

  • Receive NHS services free of charge, outside of certain exceptions.
  • Get treatment that is appropriate to your needs and preferences.
  • Refuse treatment.
  • Be respected and treated fairly. 
  • Expect patient confidentiality and transparency to ensure informed consent.
  • Share feedback or concerns about your care.
  • Not have NHS treatment refused unreasonably.
  • Not be discriminated against on grounds including gender, race and age.

As we mentioned at the beginning of this guide, such rights also come with responsibilities. For example, patients can be reasonably refused access to NHS care if they treat NHS staff abusively or violently.

Do You Have The Right To Choose A Hospital?

It is important to feel comfortable with the hospital you are treated at. With that in mind, NHS patients have the right to select treatment options, including the hospital they are referred to. You can even request that you are treated, or not treated, by a particular doctor.

The request can only be rejected if there are reasonable grounds such as the hospital being full. As you may expect, choosing your hospital may not be possible where emergency treatment or another form of urgent medical attention is required.

What Is The Maximum Waiting Time For NHS Patients?

The NHS states that the maximum wait time for non-urgent, consultant-led treatment is 18 weeks from the appointment date. 

Maximum waiting times for urgent care may vary depending on how busy the hospital’s A&E department is. In any case, delays should never be caused by a medical professional breaching their duty of care.

If substandard care leads to an extended waiting period and results in a delayed diagnosis, you could seek compensation for a condition becoming worse if timely care would have prevented it. Learn more by calling the number at the top of the page and talking to an advisor.

What Are Your Rights As A Private Hospital Patient?

Naturally, the main difference between a private and public service is that entitlement to free care is not among hospital patients’ rights.

The clinical practice you choose may have its own code of conduct. Outside of this, a healthcare professional can look to professional standards set out by regulators. For example, doctors can refer to the General Medical Council (GMC) overview of good medical practice, while nurses should follow the code set out by the Nursing & Midwifery Council. Professionals at NHS organisations should also aim to meet the standards set out by the relevant regulatory body.

Many people go to private healthcare providers because they expect high quality care, but medical negligence can occur just as it could happen in an NHS hospital. Wherever you experienced substandard care, you can get support by calling us or getting in touch online today.

How To Complain About A Hospital

Hospital patients’ rights include an entitlement to complain if the quality of care is not up to standard. If you were treated unfairly or given substandard care by a health professional, you could complain to the:

  • Hospital itself.
  • Local NHS Trust, if you were treated in an NHS hospital.
  • NHS Resolution, which resolves complaints and claims against NHS services.
  • Relevant regulatory body, such as the GMC.
  • Care Quality Commission (CQC), an independent English health and social care regulator.

Naturally, if negligent treatment led to you suffering significant harm that could have been avoided, you may wish to do more than complain. Read on to the next section and give us a call to learn about claiming hospital negligence compensation.

How A No Win No Fee Solicitor Could Help You Claim For Medical Negligence

Our solicitors use their knowledge and experience to help clients recover fair compensation for the effects of medical negligence, which includes but is not limited to the person’s pain and suffering or current and future treatment costs. They can also offer expert support with key tasks such as helping you prove hospital negligence and ensuring the relevant paperwork is submitted correctly.

If you have a valid claim against a hospital and choose to work with one of our solicitors, you would be offered a Conditional Fee Agreement. This would entitle you to:

  • Expect to pay nothing in solicitor fees upfront or as the case progresses.
  • Not pay for the solicitor’s work at all unless the claim is successful.
  • Receive the clear majority of the compensation awarded if the case wins. A legal cap established by The Conditional Fee Agreements Order 2013 ensures that only a small percentage goes the solicitor’s way.

A solicitor with their left hand extended and using their right to write in a book. A solicitor can discuss hospital patients' rights to claim compensation.

 

Contact Us

You can learn even more about your rights as a hospital patient by contacting us today. Furthermore, if you want to find out if your rights extend to the ability to sue a hospital, just ask an advisor to assess your potential claim. You could find that you’re quickly connected to an expert solicitor for dedicated legal guidance if you have reasonable grounds to claim.

We’re also easy to reach, so please don’t hesitate to either:

Further Resources On Hospital Patients’ Rights

Here are some more guides from our collection:

Also check out these resources for further background information.

  • NHS information on how to request a copy of your health records. Medical records can be a useful source of evidence in a medical negligence claim.
  • NHS Resolution’s annual statistics for 2022/23, including compensation claim figures.
  • GOV.UK guidance on litigation friends and claiming on behalf of someone who lacks mental capacity or is too young to take legal action themselves.

We hope this guide to hospital patients’ rights and responsibilities has helped. Thank you for reading, and please call if there’s anything we can help you with.