The human cost of hospital-acquired blood clots in the UK means that, last year, up to 25,000 people may have died from a preventable deep vein thrombosis.

Now the financial cost of this disease is laid bare.

Since 2005 the taxpayer has had to foot a bill of over £110m in litigation payouts for blood clots missed by the NHS. This cost shows no sign of slowing, with the bill expected to top a quarter of a billion pounds by 2015.

To make matters worse, NHS data shows that more than 80 per cent of hospital trusts are still failing to meet Government risk-assessment standards.

This leaves 4.5 million patients unassessed and at risk of developing a potentially fatal blood clot, and the public purse exposed to costly claims of negligence.

The NHS can ill afford this huge financial burden, and patients should expect far better treatment in the first place. England’s 163 hospital trusts must ensure they meet the minimum acceptable standards of DVT risk-assessment for in-patients.

It will go a considerable way to both saving lives and saving the NHS money.

John Black, President Royal College of Surgeons; Prof Beverley Hunt, Lifeblood: The Thrombosis Charity; Andrew Gwynne MP, Chairman, All-Party Parliamentary Thrombosis Group; Sharron Millen, Royal Pharmaceutical Society