Actually the applying bit was a doddle, yes it is an industrial injury, yes, you will receive £17 per week $27, yes, easy!
At that time I had been told that my pelvic 'soft tissue injury' would be all better within a year so the fact that I had this II award for a year was fair, maybe not financially
but I didn't have any time scale issue at all. Then it all got interesting, as of course I didn't get any better.I had another medical when my payments were stopped as I now had a physio's report that I had piriformis syndrome, PS. Yes, come along,touch toes, yes, the Dr will understand about the problem. . . ER! NO! he did not! so I got no where. Appealed, nothing. Appealed again and was allocated a tribunal spot to 'put my case'. It was adjourned because of their admin error and allocated again for September just gone (over 3 years since my first application) This time I had a PS and PN diagnosis however, it would be straight forward, so I went on my own, confident that all of the material I had supplied would make the tribunals decision a forgone conclusion.
The tribunal consisted of a 'judge' and a Dr. and was horrendous. I was correct in that the decision was a forgone conclusion, but it was more like, this woman is obviously a time wasting, deceitful, duplicitous,fraudster. Pundendal neuralgia, never heard of it! Piri what? They called my Dr's quacks and mentioned a long jail sentence and made me cry
Hell! if I was going to make it all up I probably would have thought of something I had heard about before, rather than my bum's sore! ~shakes head~
If I've bored those who know the story so far I apologise, and apologies to the rest, because there is more to come.
Almost 2 hours later the whole thing was adjourned (again) as the tribunal decided to ask the Secretary of State for help. Now the government is involved. . .it's only me for goodness sake!! I couldn't believe the whole thing had gone so bonkers! but anyway the S of S delegated the task to some Dr. in Leeds called Leris.
I have been sent a copy of her findings, she was tasked to research a) the accepted and recognised cause of PN and PS. b)nature and effect and, c) treatment of these conditions and, d) experts in this field.
Through her research she has managed to establish that. . . .drum roll. . . .PN and PS DO EXIST!!!. . . .*~fireworks~*@~* Because of the Nantes criteria and a paper by Dr Hibner the diagnosis of PN is not controversial, she was even happy to state that PN can be caused by trauma. However, 'foreign' material didn't seem to cut it with her regarding PS so she asked a spinal surgeon who has never seen PS or PN. HHHmmmm could that be because he is a spinal surgeon, there was a clue wasn't there. . .
He informed her that his understanding of PS is that it can only occur spontaneously and 'CAN NOT BE CAUSED BY TRAUMA'.
It's actually difficult to find anything on PS that doesn't mention 'can be caused by trauma'; There are whole case studies on 'post traumatic PS' where 10 out of the 14 cases had a simple fall on their bum's. American though. . . foreign, no good! and neither of her other 'experts' are names we know.
I am deeply ashamed that our NHS and social services systems still think they are the only ones in the world who have any answers. This green and pleasant land. . . .Land of hope and glory (Yes I did go to Proms night at my Dad's local church, have to, he organises it) It would be if we weren't so insular and up our own!
But if anyone needs to prove that PN exists to their Dr or specialist the British government have decided that it does
.Ding, Ding round 4. . . .
