Urological litigation trends in the UK National Health Service: an analysis of claims over 20 years.

The number and cost of litigation claims have increased year on year. There is a need for continual improvement in patient care, surgical training, counselling, informed consent and early management of complications. The evidence reviewed in this paper suggests that the best approach to this is the combination of rigid adherence to and re-enforcement of common surgical guidelines and implementation of the national 'Getting it right first time' initiative.