A keen eye for detail delivers the best results
Ask medicolegal experts why they enjoy the job and many will say they enjoy it for the “detective work” involved. They have a keen eye for the kind of detail that can be overlooked even by top medical professionals making them ideal expert witnesses for the legal profession.
It is one of the main reasons that made Dr Charalampos Kartsios take up medicolegal work. “I have a reputation for being extremely thorough. If I am sent 3,000 pages of information, I will go through all of them and there have been cases where there was a detail somewhere that everyone else has missed,” he explains.
“The other important fact is that medicolegal work makes me a better doctor. We learn from our mistakes but we learn more from other people's mistakes and omissions.”
Dr Kartsios is a Consultant Haematologist, Lead for Anticoagulation Services, and Chair of the Thrombosis Committee at University Hospitals Derby and Burton (UHDB) NHS Foundation Trust.
Born in Thessaloniki, Greece in 1971, he graduated from the medical school of the Aristotle University of Thessaloniki in 1995 and finished his haematology specialisation in 2005.
In 2007 he was awarded the Hellenic Society of Haematology Scholarship and came to the Haematological Malignancy Diagnostic Service in Leeds where he perfected his clinical and laboratory skills under Professor Peter Hillmen and Dr Andy Rawstron.
Dr Kartsios returned to Greece where he worked until 2011 as a Consultant Haematologist at Papageorgiou Hospital in Thessaloniki before returning to the UK in a substantive consultant post at Birmingham Heartlands Hospital. He moved to UHDB in 2021.
“I'm a consultant haematologist covering thrombosis and general haematology. My area of expertise has to do with patients who have experienced unexplained bleeding, venous thromboembolism including pulmonary embolism and deep vein thrombosis (DVT), stroke, blood abnormalities that can predispose to blood clots, obstetric haematology, and blood cancers. It’s a wide area but my reputation has been built on dealing with blood clots,” he explains.
He chose his particular specialisation after being asked to step in to help with thrombosis work at Heartlands hospital. “I enjoyed it and it has become a very creative journey and a big opportunity for me,” he says.
Dr Kartsios has gone on to become a principal investigator for clinical trials involving warfarin and direct anticoagulants. He also has 33 publications in peer-reviewed journals and is a regular guest speaker at events focusing on his discipline.
As for medicolegal work, he has built up several years’ experience, having been recommended by a former colleague.
He says: “One of my mentors used to do medicolegal and when he retired, passed my details to Moore Barlow solicitors in London. This is how I received one of my first cases and then I was approached by a couple of other solicitors.
“As a result, I undertook expert witness training and subscribed to the Faculty of Expert Witnesses. I signed up with TLA in 2020. After that, it was more like an avalanche and this year I will produce probably 70 medicolegal reports.”
Dr Kartsios’ area of expertise is clearly in demand and he enjoys the challenge. “There is the ‘usual’ instructions covering DVT and pulmonary embolism following surgery or a road traffic accident. This is quite predictable. But I have been given lots of challenging cases, for instance, involving people who were given the wrong anticoagulant or the wrong antidote to reverse anticoagulation. I have to build a case why this was wrong and what should have happened’.
“I look into cases of people given the wrong diagnosis, those forgotten by the system for years. We need to learn and we need to improve and keep up to date. It is something I enjoy because every case is different and a challenge.”
Dr Kartsios works on both personal injury and clinical negligence cases and has nothing but praise for his Senior Case Manager, Kelly Booker and the rest of the team.
“Kelly has been there for me from the very beginning. She is more of a friend rather than just someone who emails me the instructions,” he adds.
“My relationship with TLA as a consultancy is much deeper than the other agecies I work with and it’s easy to work with TLA.”
Outside of his practice, Dr Kartsios is a father to four children and also is also a keen gardener and cook.
“I’m the “doesband” in my household – the husband who does everything!” he says.
Please email Senior Case Manager Kelly Booker on kelly@tla-medicolegal.com for Dr Kartsios’ CV and further information.