Laura's burns rehabilitation therapy

On the 23rd of June last year something happened which changed our lives forever. Our mum, Laura had an unimaginable accident where her dress caught fire on the gas stove at home. It took mum only perhaps a minute to realise what was happening before her instinct to drop and roll kicked in. However by then she sustained third degree burns to half of her torso, underside of her arm, her entire armpit and the tops of her thighs. A third degree burn is also called a full thickness burn.

Our wonderful neighbour drove my mum and me to the hospital having spent an hour lying in the shower due to a lack of ambulances and from there her road to recovery began. Now when I say ‘road to recovery’ the complex nature of a burn is that full recovery doesn’t really exist, initially managing the pain as you can quite imagine is where everyone’s focus is. Mum continues to this day to need pain medication and support. A burn takes two to three days to fully develop so the doctors don’t know the full extent of the injury until then, it turned out she needed grafting on all of her burns. This meant that mum would have healthy skin removed from her thighs to replace what had been lost. I struggle to put into words what grafting actually is but imagine having a burn the size of mums and then having to injure the okay bits to fix the not okay bits. Grafting is brutal but necessary. There was also a risk her grafts would not be successful.

During her stay mum was heavily bandaged, bed bound and in pain. She was enduring dressing changes and bathing every two days which would take up to 3 hours. Not at least the process of realisation of what had happened to her body in a matter of 30 seconds to a minute! Heartbreakingly her grafts failed by 75%, this was a disaster and meant that she would have to go through the whole process again. This meant having to wait for her legs to heal and that they would harvest the skin again from her thigh. Two weeks later they repeated the surgery. This time her grafts were in the main successful and her healing could really begin.

During all of this she was receiving psychological support through the NHS team which helped support her through this time, as well as family and friends visiting daily and FaceTime becoming our best friend on the days we couldn’t make it to Nottingham!

After being sent home, we were introduced to the Katie Piper Foundation. This charity offer everything from scar management to psychological support, it was this that we utilised them for the most initially. Their support was also offered to family members directly affected by the accident which we are forever grateful for. Mum was still having to travel every 3 days to Nottingham hospital for baths and dressing changes which would still take a long time and a lot of energy on her behalf, this also meant relying on her sister Anna to drive her to every appointment so impacted on her day to day life heavily too! She was being seen by multiple teams throughout the hospital, one of which was occupational therapy, who provided her with pressure garments which she has to wear for 23 hours a day for a minimum of 2 years. Once her wounds were at a more manageable point she was discharged to Leicester’s outreach team, whose nurses visited the house for dressing changes instead. This continued for several weeks with the team also teaching us at home how to change the dressings on smaller areas between appointments. She required regular drug reviews through the GP as she was still on such high doses. Once her dressings were vastly reduced the medical intervention slowed and a lot fell on us and our mum herself to manage. This involved massaging and moisturising the scar areas multiple times a day, physio exercises, yoga stretches and still hospital visits to monitor progress. These hospital visits included seeing her occupational and physio therapists who have been very hands on with massage and exercises as well as using the lymphatouch machine.

The Katie Piper foundation had still been working with my mum through all of this with various interventions provided. They offered mum the opportunity to go to their rehabilitation centre for a week, this included psychological sessions, yoga, physio, skin camouflage and personal training. However the biggest benefit to this stay was the introduction of the LPG machine. This works by effectively draining the tissue and preventing the formation of scar adherences whilst simultaneously stimulating natural collagen to improve the healing process therefore easing pain, restoring mobility and the overall long term appearance of scars. LPG becomes costly as it is needed regularly and over a longer period of time.

LPG is available in the UK, mainly city locations, so could be accessible to my mum whilst still staying at home. The alternative which we are currently looking into is a private rehabilitation facility in France, this is the centre Katie Piper was referred to. This visit will be for a month and she will have a session everyday to ensure the greatest long term results in her scarring. As you can imagine this is an expensive option, however the best.

We are still currently working out which option will suit best and have multiple professionals involved in making this decision. So for now we are asking for donations to help towards us paying for which ever option is chosen, UK LPG sessions or France rehabilitation facility. Any donations we have left after will be going to the Katie Piper Foundation to help fund their work.

Mum would describe a burn like having an alien on you and she would describe the intense feeling of grief she felt for the person she once was. She has been the most incredible person through this and never have I experienced bravery like it. We are so proud of our mum but desperately want to help her get the best outcome possible!

A massive thank you in advance for any donations made, they will make such a difference to my mums recovery.

Much love,

Elouise, Izzie, Laura, Anna and all our family x