National PTSD Awareness Day – 27 June 2023

Today is Post Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD) awareness day, an important day to raise awareness of such a serious psychological condition.

PTSDis a psychological disorder suffered by many people and is often suffered when a person has experienced a traumatic event such as sustaining a Personal Injury in a Road Traffic Accident, an Accident at Work, from a dog bite or even a PublicLiability accident such as a slip or trip in a public place.

At Norrie Waite and Slater we see many of our clients become affected by psychological injury following an accident or traumatic event, not just in the form of PTSD but other psychological conditions such as anxiety, stress and depressive disorders.

Sarah Tagg of Norrie Waite & Slater specialises in Personal Injury claims and has acted for many clients who have suffered from PTSD and other psychological injuries.  She says:-

”PersonalInjury is a big ordeal for many of my clients, it can affect their work and home lives and in addition to their physical injury it can affect them mentally.  The mental effects from a traumatic injury or assault can lead to feelings of anxiety, insecurity, worthlessness, stress and depression.  In serious cases where people may have been assaulted or sexually abused, or suffered from serious life changing injury, PTSD is also often diagnosed.”

PTSD does not always onset immediately following a traumatic event/injury and can develop later, some times weeks, months or even in some cases, years after the traumatic event/injury.  It is sometimes the case that clients do not realise that they have a psychological condition such as PTSD which is why it is important to seek medical help as soon as possible.

Symptoms often include feeling low or teary, feeling anxious or angry, suffering from panic attacks or even the feeling of fear in some cases. People suffering from PTSD can suffer with flashbacks and nightmares because of their traumatic experience or suffer travel anxiety as a direct result of being involved in a Road Traffic Accident.

We have helped our clients not only with the recovery of damages for their Personal Injury cases but by also arranging treatment for their psychological injuries. Such treatment can include Cognitive Behavioural Therapy (CBT), a talking therapy which can help manage people’s problems by looking to change the way they think and behave and deals with current problems, instead of past issues which other treatments may do. Another treatment that we see recommended for our clients and help to arrange for them to aid their recovery isEMDR (Eye Movement Desensitisation and Reprocessing) which helps people process and recover from past experiences affecting their mental health.

We work closely with Psychology experts to obtain medico legal reports for our PersonalInjury clients, to obtain a psychological diagnosis and prognosis and to obtain recommendations for psychological treatment for my clients to ensure that they have the best recovery possible, as quickly as possible.

Mental health issues are an important part of the cases that we deal with on a day-to-day basis at Norrie Waite & Slater and so to help raise awareness and to support PTSD awareness day we are fund raising across our offices by donating money from a dress down event to the charity PTSDuk https://www.ptsduk.org/contact-us/which specialises in mental health.

If you have been involved in a Personal Injury in the last 3 years and you are suffering from either physical or psychological injuries, or both and you wish to speak to someone about making a claim then please contact Sarah Tagg of our offices on 0114 2766166 or email sarah@norrie-waite.com.

We can all raise awareness of PTSD and we can help by sharing the #PTSDawareness on social media.

“We’re proud to be supporting @PTSDUKcharity during June for #PTSDawarenessmonth. Join us and help support everyone affected by PTSD, no matter the trauma that caused it.

Find out more and get involved www.ptsduk.org/ptsd-AW

#PTSDawareness

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