Hello. I am part of the team in working with our head injury solicitors in Manchester and I am employed as a Client Liaison Manager. My background is medical and I am responsible for representing our clients who have sustained a brain injury, helping them to get access to rehabilitation whilst supporting their families.
It’s a pretty familiar scenario in cartoons and sitcoms that a person gets struck on the head, sees stars’ loses their memory and behaves oddly. Then, by chance, another bang on the head instantly restores the person that was injured.
In reality, brain injuries take many different forms. Some occur naturally and are difficult to predict or avoid. Haemorrhages, tumours and viral infections can affect us at any age, often without obvious cause. An acquired brain injury (ABI) is not present at birth and the most common type is the result of damage externally, such as a sharp blow to the head. The chance of sustaining a traumatic brain injury is a lot higher than people think.
People always ask “what happens” when there is a sharp blow to the head because they presume that the skull protects the brain from damage. The skull is amazingly robust but like any other hollow shell it can be smashed and damaged. Even when the skull remains intact, the damage to the brain can be devastating. Our brains have the texture of blancmange and the inside of the skull is soft and rigid. Sudden deceleration such as a hard blow to the head or the head hitting a windscreen at anything over 20mph brings the brain into violent contact with the skull and some parts of it get bruised and torn.
A & E departments deal with visible and life threatening injuries and often the “invisible” damage to the brain is given less priority. In the hours and days after a brain injury, bruising leads to swelling and as the brain presses against the skull, blood flow becomes impaired as arteries become damaged. The treatment received during the early hours, days and weeks have a critical impact on the potential for recovery. The long term effects depend on the size and severity of the damage, but given the crucial function of each separate part of the brain, a wide range of impairments or disability may follow.
The moral of my story is to look after your brain and please do not take it for granted! It is the most important bit of you so don’t take risks. Wear a safety helmet if doing something hazardous such as cycling, mountaineering or pot holing and always wear a seat belt in a car, even as a passenger. Bones can be mended, flesh can be stitched back together but brains are a lot trickier to fix so please don’t take chances.
Irwin Mitchell support’s Headway’s campaign to provide good quality printed information leaflets to A & E departments. Sometimes, little information about what to look out for post injury is given out in A & E following injury to the head so I am personally thrilled that this information will be available to both the injured person and their families as part of my role remit includes educating the client and their families about brain injury. The role of a Client Liaison Manager is extremely rewarding and I look forward to telling you more about it in my next blog.