Combined approach works for trauma patients, audit shows

The audit was of treatment of patients at Great Western Hospital in Swindon by physiotherapist Sheila Beer. It found that 82 per cent of patients with multiple symptoms, who had previously failed to respond to conventional physiotherapy, displayed physical or emotional trauma, or were receiving significant medication, had no further outpatient appointments for physiotherapy for the same condition after Sheila Beer’s treatment.

Sheila Beer treated more than 100 patients in the year that her work was measured, and during the treatment, patients’ medication levels tended to be reduced or stopped.

Fourteen per cent of the patients did receive further physiotherapy for the same problem, and four per cent were given surgery.

Sheila Beer, who worked with her colleague Fiona Thorne, an extended scope practitioner specialising in back problems, in identifying which patients might benefit from her treatment, said that early identification of these patients prevented further deterioration in their condition and saved the NHS significant amounts of money.

Sheila Beer, who has had training in craniosacral therapy and verbal skills in dealing with trauma, said her patients ranged from those who had been involved in traffic accidents to victims of sexual abuse.

Many displayed symptoms that ‘did not add up’, and they did not fit into usual medical models. Most had received long-term physiotherapy with little or no improvement in their condition.

Sheila Beer said: ‘The verbal work combined with hands-on work seemed to be the key to the success of this treatment. I was trying to treat the cause as well as the symptoms that patients displayed.’