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A father-of-four is claiming £1 million damages after winning his legal case over a vasectomy that went wrong.
Daniel Stalker, 51, was forced to have his testicles removed and has been in pain ever since the operation 12 years ago.
Yesterday he won his case against Lothian Health Board at the Court of Session in Edinburgh, and a judge will now set damages. Mr Stalker, of Dunbar, East Lothian, is reportedly seeking £1 million in compensation.
He went for the operation in May 1996 at an Edinburgh family planning clinic after his wife fell pregnant with their fourth child.
He claimed Dr Paul Dewart tried to perform the procedure despite his protests that he was in pain and the anaesthetic was not working. The operation had to be abandoned after Mr Stalker doubled over in pain and vomited.
One of his testicles then turned black and swelled to double the size, he claimed. Two years later he had his testicles removed in an attempt to end his misery - but this has failed to alleviate the pain.
Lord Uist yesterday ruled in favour of Mr Stalker. He said: “On a consideration of the whole evidence on this point, I find that the pursuer suffered neuropathic pain... when Dr Dewart inserted an instrument into an unanaesthetised part of his scrotum in the course of blunt dissection during the attempted vasectomy procedure.”
Dr Dewart claimed he could not remember the operation, but the judge said this was hard to believe.
Lord Uist said: “The procedure here had been abandoned, he [Dr Dewart] had written a misleading letter to the GP and had not completed the operation note: he could not have forgotten what happened in this case.
“His assertion that he could not remember what had happened lacked credibility.”
Mr Stalker, a former soldier in the Royal Scots Regiment until 1984 who had since worked as a joiner. said today that he had gone through “pure hell” and had been left entirely dependent on his family to care for him.
He said: “About 20 hours a day I’m in bed, doubled up in pain. I’ve tried to commit suicide five or six times because the pain is that bad.
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