A young mother from East Harling was awarded five figure damages for injuries she received when her car collided head-on with a van.
In 2006 Claire Seager, 32 at the time and on maternity leave from her job as a pharmaceutical technician, was returning with a friend and her children from visiting Planet Zoom in Dereham. On the Hingham Road near Great Ellingham a Mercedes van which was travelling in the opposite direction crossed the road and collided with her car.
Ms Seager was trapped and unconscious and had to be cut free by the emergency services, then airlifted by the East Anglian Air Ambulance to the Norfolk and Norwich hospital.
She had broken both arms and her right leg and underwent extensive surgery. She also suffered injuries to her back and various lacerations. Ms Seager spent three days in intensive care and remained in hospital for three weeks. When she left hospital she was confined to a wheelchair for six weeks, and had to undergo physiotherapy until the end of 2007.
Ms Seager has no memory of the accident, nor of anything after leaving Dereham before the accident until three days afterwards. Details of the accident were provided by witnesses.
During her time in hospital Ms Seager was separated from her baby daughter, Ella. She found she could not breast-feed Ella without assistance because she could not hold her, owing to her broken arms.
The inability to hold her baby even after discharge from hospital continued to cause Ms Seager great distress.
'I will never get that time back,' she says.
Although her injuries have healed she is left with conspicuous scars both on her arms and her leg. Her movement is still slightly restricted and she is not expected to make any further recovery, though she has been able to adapt. She has developed travel anxiety as a result of the accident.
She decided to seek damages for her injuries from the driver of the Mercedes. She approached Diss-based lawyers and personal injury specialists comercrawley. Director Emma Crawley, who managed her legal case, explains the circumstances of the damages award.
'This has been an enormously traumatic episode in Claire's life,' Emma Crawley explains.
'She had only just given birth to her child, so the horror of the accident had an especially big impact on her. It also interrupted what had been a precious time for her, the first weeks spent with her new child. So it has inevitably been an extremely traumatic period for her.
'Fortunately we were able to negotiate Claire's claim against the other driver's insurers without recourse to a trial.
'In spite of her injuries, in many ways Claire had a lucky escape because those injuries could have been much worse. She was fortunate in having the service of the East Anglian Air Ambulance, who may have made a difference in the long-term outcome by being able to get her to hospital that much quicker and so reduce any potential complications.'
Claire Seager was eager to acknowledge the part played in rescuing her from the accident by the East Anglian Air Ambulance. 'Although I have no memory of the circumstances of the collision or what happened afterwards, I'm aware that the situation was considered serious enough to call out the air ambulance,' she says.
'It's not generally recognized that the air ambulance is not paid for by the NHS and is entirely supported by charitable donations, so I consider myself very fortunate to live in a part of the country which enjoys such a marvellous service.'
20.08.2009
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