“the true test of establishing negligence in diagnosis or treatment on the part of a doctor was whether … he has acted in accordance with a practice accepted as proper by a responsible body of medical men skilled in that particular art” Bolam 1957 This is the realty of that decision – ‘A god complex is an unshakable belief characterized by consistently inflated feelings of personal ability, privilege, superiority, and perfection. Doctors almost never take ownership of simple mistakes — and bigger mistakes are more frequently someone else's fault.’ As case law has developed, so have the principles underpinning the issue of breach of duty in medical negligence cases. This has led to a recognition that the Bolam test is not appropriate to apply in every case. Despite this the medical profession still hide behind it and literally ‘get away with murder’

‘In order for a claim for clinical negligence to succeed it has to be established that the treatment or care received was negligent. Negligence involves two components, breach of duty of care and causation. Both of these have to be proved on the balance of probabilities’. Definition of negligence. A failure to behave with the level of care that someone of ordinary prudence would have exercised under the same circumstances. The behavior usually consists of actions, but can also consist of omissions when there is some duty to act (e.g., a duty to help victims of one's previous conduct). ‘The second part is the question of causation. It is necessary to establish that the breach of duty of care identified has directly caused or contributed to the injury or damage suffered; this is referred to as ‘causation’ In legal terms, causation refers to the relationship of cause and effect between one event or action and the result. It is the act or process that produces an effect.Factual causation or actual cause is the actual evidence, or facts of the case, that prove a party is at fault for causing the other person’s harm. Cause-in- fact seeks to answer a question to the “but-for” test. The “but-for” test asks if the victim was harmed, was that harm directly caused by the defendant’s actions?