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£420,000 for accident at work in Sheffield steel industry

Graysons’ personal injury expert, Lucy Flynn, has secured £420,000 for Mr A, a Sheffield man who has been left with permanent injuries following an accident at work at a local steel manufacturer.

900kg of steel lumps fall from broken crane

Mr A, aged 43 at the Lucy Flynn wins compensation for accident at work - melting furnace time of the accident in 2011, had worked for the company for 22 years and was a qualified melter.   He had plenty of experience in his role, which was hard, but usually trouble free – until the day in August 2011, when an accident at work turned his life upside down.

Working alongside his colleagues, Mr A watched as a crane driver manoeuvred 900kg of steel lumps in a drum, hoisting it up on a single hook.  He was ready to drive the drum into the furnace when the hook sliced through the drum, which fell from the chains and crashed to the ground.  Unable to get out of the way quickly enough, the drum hit Mr A, breaking his leg and shattering his ankle. (Image shown for illustration purposes only. Not actual image.)

Constant pain and discomfort

In immediate agony, an ambulance was called.  Paramedics gave Mr A morphine and gas & air and then took him to A & E at Sheffield Northern General Hospital.  Xrays showed that he had broken his leg and dislodged his ankle.  A plaster cast was fitted and Mr A remained in hospital until the following day, when he was released with crutches and told to revisit the following week to attend the orthopaedic consultant.

The pain during the following week was excruciating and, unable to go upstairs, Mr A had to live and sleep on a sofa downstairs – although he was hardly able to sleep at all.  He relied completely on his family as he was unable to leave the house at all.   A week later Mr A had to have an operation to insert screws and plates into his ankle as it wasn’t healing properly. He returned home with his leg and ankle bandaged and in an air cast/boot, which remained for around 6 weeks before being taken off as it was damaging his skin.   Still on crutches, and in severe pain, Mr A continued living downstairs for some time.

Permanent damage

Physiotherapy followed, but the pain didn’t subside – in fact it seemed to get worse, so Mr A was given steroid injections into his ankle.  Unfortunately the injections had no effect so he was referred to a pain management consultant.  The consultant diagnosed Mr A with complex regional pain syndrome.   The pain management consultant prescribed pain killing medication, which included ‘gabapentin’.  Unfortunately, that drug caused hallucinations and other side effects, so he had to stop taking it.

After around 18 months, Mr A was still in pain – and still suffers today.  He had yet to return to work and was then advised that he wouldn’t be able to do the sort of manual job he had done previously and may well have to look for office work.

Sadly, Mr A took early retirement on the grounds of ill health.  This was a big shock to Mr A as he had enjoyed the job he was doing at the time of his accident at work and didn’t relish the thought of doing office based work.

Family tension and depression

Mr A had worked all of his life, since he was 15 years old.  Since the accident he had lived on benefits (apart from a few months’ pay from his employers), which inevitably led to financial difficulty.

The accident had caused both physical and mental strain and family life had been difficult too since he had been at home.  Unable to get out of the house, Mr A became more and more reluctant to take part in anything – despite offers from friends and family to take him out and about.  He couldn’t take part in any of the activities that he loved, such as golf and walking in the countryside and couldn’t help with household chores.

Needless to say, resolved to a life on pain killers and no satisfying job, Mr A soon started to feel very down and depressed, but was unable to speak to anyone about it, trying to get through it himself.   Eventually Mr A spoke to his GP, who diagnosed severe depression and referred him to a counsellor.

Employers admit responsibility and pay out

Lucy Flynn deals with accidents at workLucy (pictured) says “Mr A has suffered terribly due to his accident at work, and will suffer for the rest of his life.  Employers have a duty of care to their employees, to protect their health and safety at work. In this case, that duty was breached and the company accepted liability, we were then able to secure a good level of compensation for Mr A.  It is of course sad that Mr A will have pain for the rest of his life, but I hope that the £420,000 award will go some way to making life more comfortable for him and his family.”

You can read more about claiming compensation if you have had an accident at work by clicking here.

You can also find out more about depression and how it might be dealt with at Mind

Lucy can be contacted on 0114 358 9009 or by email at lucy.flynn@graysons.co.uk

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