Fact-finding tour helps creation of ABI Strategy

Efforts to gather information which will help in the creation of the new Acquired Brain Injury (ABI) Strategy have been boosted through Chris Bryant MP’s visits to key neuro-rehabilitation sites around the country. 

The MP – chair of the All Party Parliamentary Group (APPG) on ABI, who has been instrumental in securing the go-ahead from the Government to create the Strategy – visited sites in Newcastle, Sheffield and Birmingham to gain greater insight into what provision exists and what more is needed. 

The Strategy has been hailed as being of vital importance in helping to support people living with brain injury and to help level the disparity in provision across the country.

Chris – also co-chair of the ABI Strategy Programme Board – visited Walkergate Park in Newcastle with UKABIF’s chief executive, Chloe Hayward, who is co-chair of the Strategy’s Patient and Public Voice Reference Group. 

The Tyneside centre provides neuro-rehabilitation and neuropsychiatry services for adults with a disability caused by injury or disease affecting the brain or spinal cord.

They met with staff and patients at the 64-bed centre, learning about the range of rehabilitation offered by its specialist neuro-rehab team, and the equipment and technology available to help people affected by ABI to live as independently as possible.

In Sheffield, they visited Steps rehabilitation centre, which provides 23 rooms for residential rehabilitation, and offers everything from hydrotherapy to music therapy, alongside the latest technology to benefit patients’ lives. 

On their trip to Birmingham Women and Children’s Hospital, to see what rehabilitation services are available for children, Chris met with staff, patients and families on a tour of the city centre hospital and also spoke with The Child Brain Injury Trust.

At each location, staff and patients were given the opportunity to say what they thought was needed to improve the lives of those living with ABI.

“These visits have been hugely helpful as we look to gather information and first hand views from people working in ABI neuro-rehabilitation,” said Chris, whose Private Members’ Bill led to the Government granting approval for the creation of the ABI Strategy. 

“If the ABI Strategy is to be fit for purpose, we need to know what is currently working, but perhaps more importantly, what isn’t working in order to ensure the needs of people with an ABI are properly addressed.

“I want to say a huge thank you to everyone we met for sharing their experiences for us to consider as we take the Strategy forward.

Chloe Hayward said: “Being able to see and speak to both staff and patients means we have real life experiences from people. 

“As co-chair of the Strategy’s Patient and Public Voice Reference Group, I want to make sure patients’ views are taken into consideration when the Strategy is being established.”