The High Court awarded Patrick Keogh €38,800 in damages for injuries from a 2018 road crash, finding that he had not proved the collision caused the right-sided symptoms that led to neck surgery two years later.
Mr Justice David Holland delivered judgment in the personal injuries case on 17 January 2025. The defendant, Joan Kerins O’Keeffe, admitted liability for the crash. The dispute at trial concerned which injuries were caused by it and the resulting compensation.
Mr Keogh was driving out of Castlemorris Roundabout in Tralee on 27 September 2018 when his car was struck from behind. He went to University Hospital Kerry that day and was diagnosed with a soft-tissue neck injury. Early medical records, including his GP’s notes and a claim form he signed, recorded pain and neurological symptoms on the left side. The judge found those records persuasive despite Mr Keogh’s evidence that his symptoms had always been on the right, or sometimes on both sides.
Mr Keogh underwent cervical decompression and fusion surgery in September 2020 after developing right-arm symptoms. His surgeon, Mr Ashley Poynton, had previously linked those symptoms to the crash. But at trial, after reviewing the earlier medical records, Mr Poynton changed his opinion. He told the court the right-sided symptoms began too long after the collision to establish a connection and were not caused by it. The judge accepted that evidence and ruled that Mr Keogh had not discharged his burden of proving the right-sided symptoms or the surgery were accident-related.
The court accepted that the crash caused a moderate neck soft-tissue, or whiplash, injury with symptoms radiating to the left arm. It found that injury had resolved over two years. In assessing general damages, the judge considered Mr Keogh’s pre-existing health history and vulnerability, while concluding that the accident-related injury did not fall within the more severe category.
The court awarded €37,500 in general damages and €1,300 in special damages for minor items. It excluded €19,568 claimed for the 2020 surgery and an estimated €19,000 for possible future surgery because it found the right-sided symptoms prompting those procedures were not caused by the crash. The total award was €38,800.