Psychiatric Injury Flashcards
McLoughlin v O’Brian
Lord Atkin’s neighbour test does NOT apply to psychiatric injuries - different principles here, so don’t use general duty of care
Alcock v Chief Constable of South Yorkshire
C must demonstrate they have suffered a recognised psychiatric illness due to D’s negligence for a successful claim. E.g. PTSD
Calvert v William Hill
Addiction can constitute a recognised psychiatric illness - courts rely heavily on medical expertise here. E.g. gambling addiction = sufficient
Page v Smith
Provided SOME kind of personal injury was foreseeable, D can still be liable - does not need to be psychiatric injury that is forseeable
Alcock v Chief Constable of South Yorkshire
Courts distinguish between primary and secondary victims for psychiatric injury claims. Primary victims are those involved “mediately or immediately in the accident”. Secondary victims are “the rest”, e.g. bystanders and witnesses
Alcock v Chief Constable of South Yorkshire Police - SECONDARY VICTIMS
4 requirements also need to be satisfied for secondary victims to claim - primary victims only need to be mediately or immediately involved in the accident and prove psych. illness.
1) Proximity of relationship - must be close tie of love and affection, e.g. parent-child
2) Proximity in space and time to accident
3) Perception by own senses
4) Shock suffered as a result
Galli-Atkinson v Seghal
Accidents are NOT frozen in time, so even if C suffers psych. injury several hours after the accident, there can still be proximity of time and space
North Glamorgan NHS Trust v Walters
Courts can treat a sequence of events as one event, so that C may still be found as a secondary victim and D is liable for psychiatric injury
White v Chief Constable of South Yorkshire Police
HL modified test for primary victims RE rescuers - rescuers are NOT automatically counted as primary victims. Rather, the rescuer must be in, or believe themselves to be within, the immediate zone of danger
W v Essex County Council
Court suggested that unwitting agents of misfortune can count as primary victims regardless of whether they were in the zone of foreseeable danger. C were primary victims through discovering shock of foster child sexually abusing daughter, even though they were not in the “mediate or immediate aftermath”
In Re Organ Group
Parents of stillborn children who suffered psych. injury due to their organs being thrown away were primary victims, despite not being in the mediate or immediate aftermath. Two reasons:
1) Parents were in the same position as patients of health authority
2) Stillborns are not legal persons, so not primary victims. Therefore, parents had to be the primary victims
Grieves v FT Everard
Where the risk of injury is NOT immediate and clear, or there was an intervening act that caused the psych. injury, D is not liable to C as a primary victim
Hatton v Sutherland
Workers are a separate category to primary/secondary victims - so C can claim psych. injury as an employee outside of the Alcock primary/secondary victim test.
Stress at work can therefore be a valid claim if there is foreseeability of psych injury. But no professions where it is more likely that C will suffer psych. injury
Hartman v South Essex Mental Health and Community NHS Trust
C can bring a claim for psych. injury where D breaches their duty of care by NOT providing psychiatric counselling - employers have a duty to provide counselling for stress at work situations
Butchart v Home Office
Stress at work duty extends to less clear employer-employee relationships - prisoner could claim for psych. injury due to prison not providing counselling for witnessing the suicide of his cellmate
