A spinal cord injury compensation claim can feel like a slow moving process. But a good spinal cord injury lawyer knows how to prioritise each stage of that process, to get the best possible outcome for the claimant. Getting the best outcome means more than achieving a substantial settlement in the future – it means initial support and opportunities that allow for a better today. Find out more about the process and how Aspire Law acts as an advocate for SCI people, their families and the wider community.
Stages of a Spinal Cord Injury Compensation Claim
One of the biggest advantages we have at Aspire Law is our unique partnership with the spinal cord injury charity, Aspire. In fact, we maintain a 50% profit share with the charity, which helps Aspire to support more people affected by spinal cord injuries.
With this partnership, we can help more people, too.
Immediate Needs
Beyond medical treatment and initial recovery, which are the absolute priority, keeping your immediate needs catered to is vital. The biggest parts of this are work and being able to keep a roof over your head.
We’ll help you and your employer to navigate the first parts of the process, and we can advise on how to deal with your mortgage provider and creditors.
Where appropriate, we can advise you and your family with an immediate needs assessment – which allows us to seek an interim payment to cover you while your claim progresses, help you claim relevant state benefits and emergency funding, and assign you a case manager.
Rehabilitation
As part of your claim, we may be able to arrange for further private spinal rehabilitation.
Publicly funded SCI rehabilitation centres (which we fully support through our partnership with the Aspire Charity) are exceptional. Often, our clients require more intensive spinal rehabilitation than what publicly funded SCI centres can offer. If your case is suitable, we will always look into this option. We have many clients who have benefitted from this top up rehabilitation.
There is also the possibility that you were never offered or were able to accept a place in a specialist NHS spinal centre.
Generally, a private rehabilitation will have a shorter waiting list, with access to the same specialist physicians, who can get you into treatment quickly – and to get you the best outcome, time is of the essence.
Read more about what happens in spinal cord injury rehabilitation.
Adapted Housing
Part of rehabilitation is gaining independence in as many areas as possible. To achieve this, adaptations may need to be made to your home, or you may need to find a new home that can accommodate your needs.
The cost of adapted housing is built into a claim, but it can take time to resolve in full. While that’s in progress, we can help with sourcing materials and tradespeople to carry out home adaptations.
Essential Equipment
Powered and manual wheelchairs are expensive pieces of equipment, but essential to the majority of people with SCIs. Access to mobility and adaptive equipment that makes day-to-day life run smoothly – or makes it possible at all – is imperative, and sourcing it is an important early factor for a successful outcome.
Within your claim, there’s usually a portion for ongoing maintenance and procurement of this equipment – but in the earliest parts of the process, Aspire Law can help you get set up with the essentials.
Ongoing Support
Through our contacts and partnerships, we offer injured persons and their family members counselling and support. It’s an ongoing process that’s never really finished – but it adds immeasurable value to the lives of people with SCI and their families.
We’re also available to talk about the claim details and progression at all times during the process, while we endeavour to secure your future.
Final Settlement
There are three components to a final settlement for a spinal cord injury compensation claim: general damages, special damages and future losses.
General damages covers the pain and hardship caused by a personal injury, and this is hard to determine. What is the measure, or the value, of one’s pain? Aspire Law only deals with spinal cord injury claims, so our experience in negotiating this aspect is highly specialised.
For spinal cord injury compensation claims, the figure for general damages can reach hundreds of thousands of pounds – over a quarter of a million in the most severe cases.
The next component, special damages, is slightly more straightforward as it covers all the reasonable costs you have incurred as a result of your injury, which you wouldn’t have incurred otherwise. This could include travel costs to hospitals, adapting your current home and any equipment you have needed to purchase as a result of your injury.
The next section is future losses. This looks at what you will need in the future as you age. We consider how your needs can continue to be met and what the cost of this will be, as well as any losses you will have in the future as a result of your injury.
But it’s by no means simple, and getting the best settlement requires expert knowledge of the immediate and long term effects of a spinal cord injury.
Special damages and future damages together can run into the millions, depending on the severity of injury, and the injured person’s work and life stage.
Timescales are very hard to determine – and the reality is that claims can take years to come to a final settlement. Importantly, we know how to get the best possible outcome that will benefit you and the wider SCI community by giving timely, specialist support when you need it most.
So, even in a claim that takes three years to complete, you’ll have our ongoing support to live the best life possible until your claim settles.
Supporting People with SCI
Raquel Siganporia is a Senior Solicitor and Director of Business Development at Aspire Law – the only law firm dedicated to helping people with spinal cord injuries. Not only do we support people through spinal cord injury compensation claims, but we work tirelessly to get the best possible outcomes for people with SCIs – regardless of whether they have a claim.
Contact Raquel free of charge and in confidence on 0800 030 20 40 or at Raquel.Siganporia@aspirelaw.co.uk.
Alternatively, complete this form and one of our Spinal Injury specialists will contact you.
