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Rehabilitation therapies and personal injury compensation

By Ian Morris | Updated July 21st, 2022

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Any personal injury claimant who continues to suffer from their symptoms has a right to seek rehabilitation therapy in a bid to ease their situation. They can recover more quickly, return to normality sooner and are able to continue to earn their income as they did before they were injured.

Third-party insurers are keen to help claimants recover from their injuries as quickly as possible to minimise the total settlement value. Paying for the costs of therapy early on avoids the potential for injuries to become ongoing and add to their costs for treatment and loss of wages.

There are two routes that a claimant can use to pursue rehabilitation therapies – seeking NHS or private therapy on their own, or by requesting that the party against whom they are claiming provides the therapy.

NHS and private therapy

Accessing rehabilitation therapies is something that can be done by yourself. If you are suffering ongoing symptoms you can make an appointment to see your GP, and after an assessment they can refer you to a physiotherapist and possibly to other practitioners. Your solicitor can access reports of any treatment by way of your medical records if any such treatment is provided. The downside to using the NHS is that there is often a lengthy waiting list to access rehabilitation therapies and the kinds of rehabilitation therapies are often limited to just physiotherapy.

You can, of course, access a wide range of specialist rehabilitation therapies on a private basis – acupuncture, massage therapy, osteopathy, chiropractic treatments or any other relevant help. The benefit of this is that treatment can be accessed immediately. The obvious downside is that it can be expensive and this is often the thing that prevents personal injury claimants getting beneficial rehabilitation therapies quickly.

If you are able to access such treatments on a private basis, we would recommend that you do so – but that you speak to us or your specialist solicitor about it. You may well be able to recover the costs of such treatments but you will need to provide evidence of the costs you’ve had and the treatments provided. Therefore it is essential that the rehabilitation therapist that you use makes notes of the treatments that you have had and that you retain receipts for payments you make.

Rehabilitation provided by the third-party defendant

Perhaps the best and easiest course of action is to request that the organisation or party against whom you are claiming provides you with a course of treatments at their cost. This can be done when your solicitor has obtained an admission of liability from them – when they agree that they are responsible for the accident in which you have been injured and will therefore pay you compensation for the injuries and losses you have sustained.

When this happens, your specialist solicitor will organise an assessment for you. This will be done in a location that is easy for you to access and again at no cost to yourself. The person carrying out the assessment of the injuries is usually a specialist GP with expertise in the area relevant to your claim.

An assessment will usually involve a brief consultation with the expert having a copy of your medical records showing the treatments you have had to date, and discussing with you the nature of the accident in which you were injured. They will then carry out a physical examination, assessing your range of motion, mobility and areas of pain.

From this, they can write a report and recommend a course of relevant rehabilitation therapies, whether it be 6 sessions of physiotherapy, 10 sessions of osteopathy or any other treatment kinds.

How we can help

If you have been injured in any kind of accident that was not your fault, you should consider making a claim for injury compensation even if just to access rehabilitation therapies. At Direct2Compensation we are more than happy to speak with you and offer you our thoughts, helpful advice and information about your rights and whether or not we feel that you can make a successful claim.

It’s usually really quick for us to find out if you have a valid claim, just leave a question below or call us on 01225 430285, or we can call you back.

63 questions have been answered on this subject - ask us your question

Comments & Questions

Read on for questions and advice about claiming...

If I’m 100% to blame in an accident and I’ve had physio treatment who pays for that?

If you are at fault, you will have to fund any rehabilitation therapy or treatments that you need – at least those that the NHS will not provide.

What happens if I was told I need 8 sessions and only did 4 and I was claiming for a crash, I was happy with 4 and the exercises he gave me was helping a lot and was too busy to make a few, so I just stop, will this hurt my claim?

It won’t ‘hurt’ your claim necessarily, but may impact on the final settlement value applied to your claim. By ending your sessions, you are stating that you have recovered (or that is at least the way a defendant will see it), which impacts on settlement value.

You should of course always discuss any choices such as the one you have made directly with your Solicitor or the claims handler as well as simply ending your treatment.

Hi I had an accident at work which resulted in me having to attend physiotherapy and hydrotherapy. I will have to attend 12 hydrotherapy sessions and at least 5 physiotherapy sessions. My question is do the more sessions i attend increase my compensation amount? Or does it make any difference?

The final settlement value that will be agreed in your claim for compensation will depend on the outcome of your treatments and to what extent you have recovered from the injuries you have sustained. Typically, a medical assessment will be conducted by a suitably qualified medical expert relating to the injuries of the claimant. The medical expert will assess the claimant in person, discuss the incident in which they were injured, review the medical treatment (medical records) provided and talk about what symptoms persist. The medical expert will then make recommendations regarding appropriate rehabilitation therapies and then give a prognosis as to what extent the claimant will recover and how long recovery will take.

Once the report is agreed by both claimant and defendant, the two side of the claim will begin to negotiate an appropriate settlement value.

Hello
My claim notification form RTA1 has been submitted and the insurance company sent me this. Where it says ‘physio’ the box is ticked for ‘no’ but I haven’t seen a physio yet and I waiting on a phone call to book an appointment. Once I have been seen by the physio etc will this be sent to the third party? As I’m worried this will effect my settlement figure what I am entitled to?

The physio issue is unlikely to impact on settlement value. At the appropriate time, the extent of the injury should be noted by way of an experts medical report and it is from this that an appropriate settlement valuation can be calculated.

My solicitor has arranged a course of physio after an accident does the insurance company wait until these treatments are finished before they offer a settlement?

Not necessarily! It can be the case that it is wisest to wait for all rehabilitation therapies to have been provided in order that the full extent of recovery is better understood than attempting to make a settlement when you don’t fully know how well you will be. Recovery from an injury is very relevant when experts undertake their work in evaluating the appropriate compensation settlement value in a claim for personal injury compensation. This is a logical matter, as the more longer term an injury will be present (or even permanency of an injury), the higher the value of settlement.

You should speak with your Solicitor regarding your specific claim.

I’ve had medical with orthopaedic consultant. Report went to solicitor. He suggested in report to see psychologist. I have seen psychologist. She says I need cbt therapy. Other side have accepted full liability for car accident. Will I have to wait for my compensation until cbt sessions have started and finished?

In most cases, where the defendants have admitted liability in full and then an independent medical report (as you have already had) is agreed by both sides, the usual process would be for the defendants to arrange, and pay for, the required rehabilitation therapy. In your case, you should check directly with your Solicitor as to whether or not the 3rd party will be taking this course of action.

If I use a rehabilitation company to arrange various different types of rehab post a RTA, will the expenditure incurred be deducted from my final compensation amount, leaving me worse off than if I’d arrranged the rehab through the NHS myself?

The cost of specialist rehabilitation therapies can form part of the total compensation settlement value that can be claimed, if successful with a claim. In most cases, a specialist medical expert will have provided a report that stipulates the need for certain therapies and an appropriate amount of treatments. If this is in place, and the medical agreed, it is often the case that the defendant will meet these costs before paying the compensation for the pain, discomfort and distress of the injury (and any loss of income/incurred costs) at the closing of the claim.

In your case, you should check with your Solicitor as to what the defendants have agreed to fund.

If you don’t want to do rehab anymore will it affect your claim?

Refusing treatment or therapy won’t damage your claim as such, but it could have an impact on claim settlement value. If you have a specialist Solicitor representing you in your claim you should speak with them before taking any decision about ceasing rehabilitation therapy.

My personal injury lawyer has cancelled my physiotherapy, we are in dispute with the third party – who’s to blame? Do you think this is an indication the claim isn’t going well?

If liability is disputed – which is not unusual – your Solicitor cannot be certain that your claim will succeed and as such, is wise to cancel the rehabilitation therapy in order to avoid costs that may not be recoverable. As soon as liability is admitted, then the rehab can start again as the cost for the therapy would then be the responsibility of the 3rd party.

If the defendants insurance have offered to pay for rehabilitation therapy – is that an admission of guilt?

It would be reasonable to assume that their offer to finance the cost of rehabilitation therapies indicates an admission of liability.

Ian morris thank you for your reply, I appreciate you getting back to me,

To all intents and purposes, yes! A defendant insurer would not wish to pay for rehab therapies if they felt that they were in no way liable for the injuries sustained.