Putting things together again

Noel Fitzgerald a.k.a The Supervet and Alex Lewis of the his own Trust both spoke at FortisNet

It is a privilege of Drawnalism that we get to attend inspiring events with interesting people. And sometimes amid the enthusiasm which such events nearly always grow there are things you hear which just flat out humble you while you are at work. FortisNet was a day which had more than its fair share of them.

Small day-to-day challenges and problems take on a whole new perspective when you consider the challenges of living without parts of your key tool - also known as 'you'.

At the event, organised by The School of Life Sciences at the University of Southampton, we listened to people who routinely make the damaged body whole again using all of the ingenuity available to medical science. We heard that solving problems in orthapaedics - for humans and other animals - is much more than a matter of 'part in and part out' mechanics despite the wonders of modern surgery.

Of course, solutions to problems can always be improved and one of the many powerful observations the event made  was that it is most beneficial to try and make or embrace change when things are still working well with both the potential patient and the systems that exist to help them.

It is always harder to make change for the better from a position of weakness or decline.

Noel Fitzgerald of The Humanimal Trust spoke powerfully about the commonalities between biomechanical injury in humans and animals

Our own Drawnalism team training day which has its own interest in learning seemed very timely, coming as it did just a little while after FortisNet.