About
Jessica’s background is as a skilled and experienced Healthcare Regulatory lawyer.
Following completion of her undergraduate law studies at Kings College London, Jessica gained a Masters degree in Medico-legal Aspects of Medical Practice. She subsequently went on to work as a legal advisor in the medical ethics team at the British Medical Association where she gained valuable insight into the challenges that healthcare professionals and organisations face on a day-to-day basis.
After qualifying as a solicitor in 2004, Jessica joined the Healthcare Regulatory team at a large international law firm specialising in providing legal services to the health and social care sectors in the UK. As part of this specialist team, Jessica advised both public and private health and social care sectors on a variety of health and social care regulatory and medico legal matters. Jessica’s most recent role within the Healthcare Regulatory team was as a Legal Director where she was involved in managing a large team of solicitors across a number of offices and in providing strategic advice at a high level to both commissioners and a variety of providers.
Through providing independent scrutiny of incidents and complex complaints, together with dispute resolution services to resolve care and treatment disputes, Jessica’s vision is to work with health and social care organisations and professionals to manage difficult circumstances in a more proactive and constructive way.
Skills
Serious Incidents and complex complaints
During her time as a healthcare lawyer, Jessica gained a wealth of experience in supporting organisations in their handling of serious incidents and complex complaints investigations. As a qualified solicitor advocate, Jessica appeared on behalf of healthcare organisations and professionals in Coroner’s inquests where she learned first hand the need for robust and effective investigations together with the importance of an open and transparent approach to incident management.
Jessica regularly gave strategic advice at a senior level on key organisational risks arising from complex complaints and serious Incidents and provided support and assistance to her clients in managing the legal and regulatory issues that can flow from this. She would regularly be called upon to draft terms of reference, identify and obtain relevant evidence, evaluate and scrutinise that evidence in order to establish how and why an event occurred, amend and draft reports and support organisations in identifying patient safety issues and opportunities for learning.
Care and treatment disputes
In her previous role as a healthcare lawyer, one of Jessica’s main areas of expertise was advising health and social care organisations in relation to care and treatment disputes involving incapacitated adults and children. Jessica has an in depth understanding of the legal framework that underpins this process, having regularly advised mental health care providers, acute trusts and commissioners on the interpretation and application of the Mental Health Act 1983, the Mental Capacity Act 2005 (including deprivation of liberty) and the interface between these two decision making processes. In 2018, Jessica sat on the Department of Health’s Committee looking at mental capacity and mental health interface issues as part of the Government’s review of the Mental Health Act 1983.
Throughout her legal career, Jessica dealt with many disputes between health and social care professionals, their patients and their families and has taken a number of cases to the Court of Protection and the Inherent Jurisdiction of the High court, representing the NHS where best interests are in dispute. Jessica saw first hand how the court process and outcome of those proceedings often resulted in a long lasting and negative impact, not just on the patient and their families, but also on the healthcare professionals and teams involved.
As a result, Jessica has always held the view that court proceedings should be seen as a last resort. Through the work she now undertakes for Bluebox Associates, Jessica is able to draw upon the experiences and lessons she learned during her time as a legal advisor; she can work with her clients either to develop the skills in spotting the triggers and signs of conflict and how to resolve them, or act as an independent facilitator to try to prevent disputes escalating at an earlier stage. Jessica is committed to approaching conflict in a constructive way and believes that with the right support, insight and cultural environment, disputes can be avoided and differences can be resolved.