Term
|
Definition
For a claim to lie for psychiatric injury, the claimant must suffer a medically recognised condition. Including:
- PTSD
- Pathological Grief
- Personality Disorder
- Miscarriage |
|
|
Term
|
Definition
| Leach v Chief Constable of Gloucestershire Constabulary |
|
|
Term
Psychiatric Injury:
Pathological Grief |
|
Definition
|
|
Term
Psychiatric Injury:
Personality disorder |
|
Definition
| Chadwick v British Railways Board |
|
|
Term
Psychiatric Injury:
Miscarriage |
|
Definition
| Bourhill v Young; Hay v Young [1943] |
|
|
Term
Psychiatric injury:
Sudden event |
|
Definition
Alcock v Chief Constable of West Yorkshire
The psychiatric injury must be caused by a sudden event (or shock) for an action to lie in negligence |
|
|
Term
Duty of Care:
Class of Victim |
|
Definition
There are two categories of victim of psychiatric injury:
- Primary Victims (those directly involved and in danger)
- Secondary victims (Those indirectly involved who witness a traumatic event) |
|
|
Term
Duty of Care:
Primary Victim |
|
Definition
Page v Smith; White v CC West Yorkshire
Duty of care for primary victims is established by the reasonable foreseeability of physical damage to the claimant. This then encompasses any resulting psychiatric injury for those directly involved. |
|
|
Term
Duty of Care:
Secondary Victims |
|
Definition
Alcock v CCWY:
Requirements for duty of care to secondary victims:
- A sufficiently close relationship of love and affection
- Temporal and spatial proximity to the accident or its immediate aftermath
- That the accident was observed by unaltered senses. |
|
|
Term
|
Definition
| Dealt with as normal for negligence |
|
|
Term
Remoteness:
Primary Victims |
|
Definition
D must or should have foreseen some physical injury C
Even if no physical injury occurs, D is still liable |
|
|
Term
Remoteness:
Secondary victims |
|
Definition
| Psychiatric injury (as a result of breach) must be foreseeable in a person of reasonable fortitude. |
|
|
Term
Remoteness:
Thin Skull Rule |
|
Definition
| D takes their victim as they find them. Provided that all other elements are satisfied, D is liable for greater damage due to C's existing vulnerability. |
|
|
