FINANCIAL & LEGAL
The hidden victims of Covid-19 AND HOW WE CAN HELP THEM Martin Usher, a Partner at Lime Solicitors specialising in supporting people following serious injury and major trauma, explores how Covid-19 has impacted the support available to people recovering from serious injury and highlights the important of us all coming together to fill the void.
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ollowing serious injury, such as traumatic brain injury and spinal cord injury, it is of paramount important that both the injured person and their loved ones have access to medical treatment, rehabilitation, care and support Martin Usher at an early stage to ensure that they make the best possible recovery and to enable them to as far as possible return to independent and fulfilling lives. Many of the services available to people following serious injury have been greatly impacted by the Covid-19 pandemic, like NHS resources that have been understandably redirected to deal with the pandemic, and support from charities, such as Spinal Injuries Association and Child Brain Injury Trust to mention a few, whose funding has invariably been hit by the economic conditions that accompany a pandemic. Now that all restrictions have been lifted and we move our way towards summer it would be easy to assume that everything will quickly return to normality. The development of multiple vaccines in record time and the successful rollout of the same is beyond miraculous, as is the sterling work of all of the NHS staff and volunteers who have helped our society navigate its way through the pandemic. There is however still a long way to go and there are many great challenges that we will need to overcome before we have a society that is even close to resembling what we had prior to the pandemic. Perhaps one of the greatest challenges of all will be returning the NHS to where it was before the pandemic. NHS resources are still heavily focused on tackling the pandemic
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and, as has been the case throughout the pandemic, these resources have invariably been redirected from elsewhere. By way of example, as at January 2022 the number of people on NHS waiting lists for consultant-led elective care stood at 6.1 million people compared to a figure of 3.31 million people in September 2015. There is no doubt that people who have sustained serious injury, including traumatic brain injury and spinal cord injury, are amongst the people that are waiting for further investigations, operations and therapies. These are the hidden victims of the Covid-19 pandemic. I have spent my whole career supporting people who have sustained serious injury and as such have seen first-hand how detrimental to outcomes that delays in the provision of medical treatment and rehabilitation can be. I have also seen on countless occasions the benefit that early access to appropriate medical treatment and rehabilitation can have and how appropriate care and support going forwards can transform lives in terms of enabling people to lead independent and fulfilling lives following serious injury.
There is no doubt that people who have sustained serious injury, including traumatic brain injury and spinal cord injury, are amongst the people that are waiting for further investigations, operations and therapies. sevenstarmedia.co.uk
