Personal injury news

Social services cuts funding for brain injury association

A rehabilitation centre which provides a service for brain injury patients could close within two years after having funding cut by £70,000.

The Headway centre at Ipswich Hospital provides information, support and services to people with brain injuries and plays a vital role in their recovery.

The reduction in funding is part of more than £800,000 of savings the council has had to make to day care services across Suffolk.

Chief executive at Headway, Helen Fairweather, said, "It is now more difficult for new people to access the service unless they can find funding other than through social care."

A charity campaign has been launched by Headway to urgently raise funds for patients suffering from serious personal injuries and nearly 40 charitable trusts have been written to. Unfortunately, the response of funding has been poor and many of the trusts have said they cannot help with a problem that should be dealt with by social services.

Mrs Fairview commented that some people with brain injuries who should be attending the centre several times a week can now only attend one day a week.

"These are people that we are teaching to read and write again, you wouldn't teach a child that in just one day."

"If things carry on the way they are I don't know how we are going to survive. I think the centre could well be closed within two years."

Andrew Cann, a Suffolk county councillor commented on the situation of the brain injury funding cuts and said, "It does not make sense clinically or financially to withdraw this funding and I am asking the county council to urgently review its decision."