ritise rehabilitation
and retain the multidisciplinary workforce essential to delivering
ongoing rehabilitation in the long term.’
Benjamin Powick, RCOT policy and public affairs manager,
added: ‘We have also been working closely with Conservative
MPs to help push the rehabilitation agenda. We recently held
a virtual meeting with Paul Bristow, MP for Peterborough, and
subsequently gained his support as a rehabilitation champion
in Westminster. That means he will help raise the rehabilitation
agenda; he has already asked the health secretary what work is
being done to ensure those that are self-isolating have access to
high quality rehabilitation.
‘Elliot Colburn, Conservative MP for Carshalton and Wallington,
is also supportive and has personally written to Matt Hancock to
back the calls in the cross-party letter and highlight the need to
focus on rehabilitation during COVID-19 and beyond.’
The cross-party letter follows the recent launch of the Right
to Rehab campaign, spear-headed by RCOT, the Chartered
Society of Physiotherapy and Sue Ryder, asking MPs to ensure
the NHS delivers on patients’ right to rehabilitation. A hardhitting
report launched in March warned that the failure to
provide such services would have devastating consequences
for people’s lives and bring greater costs for the NHS and social
care systems.
For more on RCOT’s work on rehabilitation, visit: www.rcot.
co.uk/rehabilitation.
The UK’s four chief AHP officers have also developed their own
statement on the AHP role in rehabilitation, available at: www.bit.
do/CAHPOs-rehab.