On the slippery slope to broken dreams

by Harriet Alexander in Bourg St Maurice Published: 7:00AM GMT twenty-eight Feb 2010

Previous of Images Next Katy Rashbrook, 20, from Woking, didn"t even have it on to a piste prior to being injured. "I slipped entrance off the train from the airport," she says, handling a grin Photo: JANE MINGAY Katheryn Ellis, left, has physio from Toby at the English Medical Centre, and Katy Rashbrook, right, is treated with colour by helper Natalie Bastian Photo: JANE MINGAY James Rolling, 34, pennyless his leg when he fell in an icy noble margin Photo: JANE MINGAY Australian Brooke Eddie, left, who harmed her wrist whilst snowboarding, and Deidre Offord, 63, from Derbyshire, who pennyless her leg Photo: JANE MINGAY Kiran Manda, elderly 41 from Harrow, in the sanatorium in sanatorium in Bourg Saint Maurice Photo: JANE MINGAY

Andy Warner never programmed to outlay his legal legal holiday lying on his behind in a small, traffic-filled locale at the feet of the Alps. As he arrived in the French ski review of Les Arcs last week, he was seeking brazen to his first-ever day on the slopes with fifteen friends. But on his initial sunrise Mr Warner, from London, collided with an additional skier and ruptured his spleen.

Not realising the earnest of his injury, the 27-year-old partner merchandiser for Topshop one after an additional skiing all afternoon, but returned to his chalet in such anguish that he was rushed to sanatorium in circuitously Bourg-Saint-Maurice.

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Had he waited an additional hour, doctors told him, he would not have lived. "He"s really propitious to be here," says Evelyne Stoertzer, a nurse.

The subsequent day, an additional part of of his organisation burst a rib; his friends additionally witnessed a Frenchman in his forties humour a deadly heart conflict in the centre of the town.

"I"m frightened right away about how dangerous it is," says Mr Warner from his sanatorium bed, dark and still wincing with the pain. "We all knew about the risk of shop-worn bones, but no one approaching this. I"m not certain if I"ll come skiing again."

The sanatorium in Bourg-Saint-Maurice, a locale of 8,000 residents, is one of the tip 10 clinics in France for breaks to the thigh bone, and the vicinity to the renouned resorts of Val d"Isère, Tignes, La Rosière and Les Arcs creates it an critical centre for the diagnosis of critical injuries.

More than 1.8 million British tourists go skiing each year, majority to France. Studies show that for each 1,000 skiers on the pistes, 3 will be harmed each day and during rise weeks at a review such as Val d"Isère, 90 people a day will need healing help. Feb is the misfortune month for accidents, accounting for 35 per cent of the total.

Indeed, a little 140,000 people were harmed in the French Alps last year, and the suit of head injuries has risen to customarily over 3 per cent, enlivening a debate for helmets to be ragged as is mandatory for young kids in Austria and Italy.

While skiers onslaught to undiluted their together turns on the mountain, in the valleys subsequent a well-oiled appurtenance tends to those whose legal legal holiday has come to an sudden halt. Last week, The Sundayspent dual days with doctors examination a approach of harmed skiers.

"The helper who manages the admissions is similar to Robocop," says Patrick Boyer, executive of the Bourg-Saint-Maurice hospital, that performs 2,500 operations a year. "She functions with dual telephones to her ears whilst sophistry the internet and checklists. At times we can have fifteen helicopters alighting on the roof tiles each day, bringing in patients from the surrounding ski resorts."

Australian banker Brooke Eddie, 26, was certified to the sanatorium with 4 skeleton shop-worn in a wrist after her initial hour snowboarding. "It was similar to a fight zone. We saw so majority people entrance in with shop-worn bones, and the sound from the helicopters alighting finished the buildings vibrate. I counted eight whilst I was watchful to see the doctor."

For James Rolling, 34, it was a stage he knew customarily as well well. Two years ago, the office workman from Cardiff cracked a bone in a leg whilst skiing in Val d"Isère, and was helicoptered to Bourg-Saint-Maurice. Now he was behind in there after his leg pennyless again with a offensive crack when he fell in an icy noble margin (a freestyle skiing turf lonesome in bumps).

"The tour from the review was horrific, as I was in the behind of an ambulance travelling head initial down a rough road. And this time I knew what all this equates to 4 months on crutches, incompetent to drive, afterwards all the slowly-slowly rehab. People don"t think about the risks when they come here. It can shift utterly fast from being a illusory place to somewhere flattering scary."

On the day of his accident, Mr Rolling was initial taken to the English Medical Centre in Val d"Isère, owned and run for the past twelve years by Dr Alan Griffiths. "We"ve had a little flattering horrible accidents here," says Dr Griffiths, 44. "One day this deteriorate we had dual people in with shop-worn backs. Earlier this year, a man in his forties pennyless both skeleton in both legs, as well as dual in his wrist. Some days it"s similar to a stage from M*A*S*H we don"t have time to even pull breath."

Early in the morning, as the chairlifts proceed carrying the initial of 30,000 skiers up the mountain, Dr Griffiths and Natalie Bastian, a nurse, hope for to embrace the injured. "I can customarily discuss it what we"re going to see when I travel to work opposite the pistes," says Dr Griffiths. "If it"s hard, packaged sleet afterwards it"s similar to descending onto petrify at 40mph and we"ll have lots of breaks. If it"s slushy, we"ll see twists. And if there are lots of tyro snowboarders on the baby slopes, afterwards it"ll be copiousness of shop-worn wrists."

Dr Griffiths"s initial customer was not a plant of the snow, however. "Alcohol might have been involved," admits a humble 31-year-old alloy who would rather not give his name. "I fell over entrance out of a club in the early hours of the sunrise and fractured multiform skeleton in my face. Half of my face is numb, so I have to go to sanatorium in Bourg to see if there"s haughtiness damage, and if I"m going to need neurosurgery."

Dr Griffiths"s subsequent dual clients were additionally pang from alcohol-related falls. "It"s common," says the alloy as the piped song in the hospital plays Another One Bites The Dust.

Sam Thompson, 23, paid for a one-way sheet to Val d"Isère, anticipating work cleaning chalets to comment his new snowboarding addiction. But the Wakefield-born anniversary workman has shop-worn dual ligaments in a knee. "I was on a blue run, but I customarily held an corner and flipped forwards, and my knees corkscrewed round," he explains. "I was disturbed I"d ripped it but it"s customarily torn, so I should be boarding again in 3 to 4 weeks. I don"t wish to be harmed and have to go home I love it here, and the nightlife is amazing."

Sophie Moynihan, 18, from Edinburgh and on her opening year, is additionally anticipating to find work on the slopes, and is study to turn a ski instructor. She hobbles in to the hospital in her Ugg boots and explains: "I was skiing in a noble margin and I disfigured somehow. Apparently I"ve pulled a vinculum and finished something to my calf muscle. But I"ve had the time of my life, and I customarily wish to get behind out there."

Stan Whitfield, 59, from Newcastle, is in no such hurry. Walking with a shaft and upheld by his mother Eva, Mr Whitfield describes how he has come all the approach from South Africa where he has lived for the past 35 years customarily to rip a tendon in his knee on his initial morning. "I did the splits entrance off a chairlift. I didn"t think that was possible."

Contrary to renouned belief, collisions in between skiers or snowboarders comment for fewer than 7 per cent of injuries, according to Swiss research. And statistically, you are eight times some-more expected to die pushing your car to the supermarket than skiing on Val d"Isère"s majority severe black run.

Katy Rashbrook, 20, from Woking, didn"t even have it on to a piste prior to being injured. "I slipped entrance off the train from the airport," she says, handling a smile. "I"ve got a hairline detonate in my elbow. It"s so frustrating, but I theory it could have been worse." To disapproving looks from Dr Griffiths, she adds: "I"m going to ski with my arm in a rope anyway."

As the hospital closes for the night, sleet is descending usually and song fills the air as the après-ski venues rigging up for a sharp-witted evening.

Dr Griffiths looks upwards, afterwards surveys the people in the surrounding bars. "We"re going to be bustling tomorrow."