£145,000 Compensation for Nurse Exposed to Asbestos at Work

How We Helped

Ms M contacted our Industrial Disease Solicitors for a free claims assessment, so she could discuss her situation with a member of our expert team. We felt she had a strong claim, and her case was taken on by Solicitor Simon Rosser who specialises in mesothelioma compensation.

Simon put together a picture of her working history to establish exactly when and where she may have been exposed to asbestos. We found that she was exposed to low levels of asbestos while working at the now-closed Ipswich Hospital as a student nurse in the mid-1970s.

While working at the hospital, Ms M would often use a shortcut along a corridor between two buildings which also housed the boiler room to get back to the nurse’s quarters, particularly when it was cold and wet, as this meant she could avoid a long walk outside.

She would use the nurse’s quarters at least once a day, as this was where the lockers were and it was prohibited to wear her nurse’s uniform outside and off the premises.

The corridor leading from the boiler house had very low ceilings of about 6 or 7 feet high and thick lagged pipes directly overhead. The lagging was in a poor state of repair, with lots of broken dusty bits hanging down. During her time at the hospital, she never saw any cleaners in this area, and there was nowhere for the dust that had built up to escape to.

Simon gathered witness statements to back up her account of conditions at the hospital, and also arranged for Ms M to be assessed by an independent medical specialist. The expert who carried out the assessment prepared a report outlining her condition, and said it’s likely to get worse over time, with Ms M suffering greater pain and breathlessness and needing more care from others.

In addition, Simon investigated the financial consequences of Ms M’s mesothelioma diagnosis, as she’d lost her main source of income when she had to stop working, and had many day-to-day living costs to meet.