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24. The Supreme Court while dealing with the case of medical negligence vide its another recent decision in Martin F. D'Souza v. Mohd. Ishfaq,(2009) 3 SCC 1 relied upon the Bolam test as appointed in Jacob Mathew's case and laid down cautions, guidelines in delaing with such cases. The following passages found in Paras 26,29, 31,34,35,40,42 and 65 may be usefully extracted below:

26. Now what is reasonable and what is unreasonable is a matter on which even experts may disagree. Also, they may disagree on what is a high level of care and what is a low level of care.

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31. As already stated above, the broad general principles of medical negligence have been laid down in the Supreme Court judgment in Jacob Mathew v. State of Punjab1. However, these principles can be indicated briefly here:

The basic principle relating to medical negligence is known as the Bolam Rule. This was laid down in the judgment of McNair, J. in Bolam v. Friern Hospital2 as follows: (WLR p. 586)  where you get a situation which involves the use of some special skill or competence, then the test as to whether there has been negligence or not is not the test of the man on the top of a Clapham omnibus, because he has not got this special skill. The test is the standard of the ordinary skilled man exercising and professing to have that special skill. A man need not possess the highest expert skill; it is well-established law that it is sufficient if he exercises the ordinary skill of an ordinary competent man exercising that particular art. (emphasis supplied) Bolam test has been approved by the Supreme Court in Jacob Mathew case.