Rehabilitation is the period in which recovery takes place following a major trauma. Rehabilitation will usually start in hospital,
Trauma rehabilitation is all about you and your healthcare team agreeing and planning ways in which to help you with the injuries you have
sustained. This might involve receiving help with physical injuries such as broken bones, but also includes receiving help with the less obvious problems
after being injured, such as your emotional and psychological welfare. How the effects of the injuries impact on your every day life and getting back to
work also needs to to be considered.
Who is involved in rehabilitation?
Your professional rehabilitation team may include some or all of the following, according to your individual needs:
• Doctors (including specialists in rehabilitation medicine)
• Nurses – both ward-based and specialist
• Physiotherapists
• Occupational Therapists
• Clinical Psychologists
• Liaison Psychiatrist
• Dietician
• Speech & Language Therapists
• Hospital Chaplain or other appropriate spiritual support
• Social workers
• Other support workers
When and where does my rehabilitation happen?
Your rehabilitation will start within two working days of your arrival in hospital and will continue after you have left hospital. A ‘Rehabilitation Prescription’ will be developed in partnership with you and will outline the rehabilitation you require over the next days and weeks and will include goals to be achieved. This provides you and your family with information regarding the injuries you have sustained and how they are likely to affect you now, and also in the future. This is an important starting point for rehabilitation.
Hopefully, you will be able to go straight home from hospital, and any follow up rehabilitation you need will be discussed with you and organised before
you leave. If your rehabilitation needs are greater, you may spend up to 28 days on the Rapid Access Acute Rehabilitation Unit on ward J2 at Salford Royal Major Trauma Centre. You may be discharged directly from there to home, or you may need further rehabilitation before you leave. If a referral to a specialist centre is required, there may be a waiting period before a bed is available.
It is important to note that it might be necessary to transfer you back to your local hospital whilst on the waiting list for a bed.
How is my progress measured?
Your progress will be checked at regular intervals to make sure that the goals set out in your Rehabilitation Prescription are being met.
When you leave the Major Trauma Centre you will be given a copy of your Rehabilitation Prescription, your GP will also receive one so that they are
aware of what has happened to you and the plans that have been made for your on-going care.
Various outcome measures are also used in rehabilitation settings to assess progress. These outcome measures form part of a national data collection system, the Trauma Audit and Research Network (TARN), and UK Rehabilitation Outcomes Collaborative (UKROC). You will be asked if you are happy to give consent to be contacted up to a year following your injury so that your progress can be checked. This will help hospital staff to see if services that accessed for people who have been injured are effective and will guide staff in making improvements to services for future patients.