Helping accident victim ride her beloved horse again

Our client, a midwife, was riding her scooter to work when she was side swiped by a car.  She fell on to her left side, her leg becoming trapped between the scooter and the road, degloving her left ankle. Degloving is a severe injury that happens when the top layers of your skin and tissue are ripped from the underlying muscle, connective tissue, or bone.

A passionate horse rider, she was unable to ride her horse for three years following the accident and hasn’t been able to return to clinical duties on the labour ward as she is unable to wear normal shoes or protective footwear.

Our immediate focus for our client was getting her the physical and psychological rehabilitation she needed and help with her pain management.  With our client’s fragile mental health at the forefront of our minds, we wanted to make sure that she had everything she needed at home to manage and return to some sense of normality.

We also knew that her horse meant everything to her and being able to care for her horse was something she was desperate to return to.  Our legal specialists helped her get some custom-made footwear to allow her to safely work at the stables and a custom-made side saddle to ride her horse.  The horse needed to be trained and conditioned not only to be ridden again after more than three years, but also to be trained to be ridden side saddle.

This has been a very difficult and complex case further complicated by the onset of chronic pain.  Given riding was her passion and ‘escape’ from the day-to-day, our specialists were on hand to help manage her mental health with the help of rehab, aids and adaptations and help guide her along a pathway back to work eventually.