As it will take until 2011 for the PRC buildings to be fully operational and, in order to ensure that our wounded get all the support they need before that, we have come up with the QRF.

Our funds, administered by the Services’ own charities, will ensure that individuals and their relatives can access H4H money to help when needed.

For example, if a wounded Serviceman needs his home upgraded to enable him to live there, and there were no other funds available, our QRF would pay for the upgrade. Similarly, if a relative has run into financial difficulty through being beside their loved one’s hospital bed, the QRF can be used to help. For further assistance please contact:

	ABF - The Soldier’s Charity	The Royal Marine Trust Fund	RAFBF Royal Air Force Benevolent Fund

The team at Headley Court know how important it is for their patients to get back to doing sporting activities that challenge and get their adrenalin flowing. A new Adaptive Adventure Training Team called Battle Back has been set up to ensure that the wounded get a chance to ‘feel the wind in the face and the sun on the back’.

We are working closely with Battle Back and will be providing funds as and when they are needed.

Read more about Battle Back

Combat Stress has launched The Enemy Within Appeal, helped by a £3million grant from Help for Heroes.
The appeal is launched to:

- raise £30m to enhance and develp mental health services for Veterans

- raise awareness of the plight of Veterans suffering from psychological injury

- encourage Veterans and their families to seek help earlier

Last year Help For Heroes gave Combat Stress, the charity that helps veterans with mental wounds, a grant of £3.5 million. The money, the biggest grant in the history of Combat Stress, has been used to pay for the much needed expansion, modernisation and reorganisation of their specialist treatment centre, Tyrwhitt House in Surrey, in order to accommodate more Veterans and to provide uprated clinical and welfare working space. Bryn and Emma Parry opened the new facilities in February 2011.

H4H Co-founder Bryn Parry said "This is a difficult subject for many to discuss and particularly hard to fundraise for. H4H were able to do it now and ensure that the centre can get on with their plans immediately and start caring for more of our mentally wounded now rather than wait.

With the increase of tours and the level of mental stress experienced it is vital that we have the facilities to give our boys and girls the best treatment, for their mental wounds as well as their physical."

Toby Elliott for Combat Stress adds:  "I wholeheartedly thank Help for Heroes for this absolutely magnificent donation.  It will enable us to rapidly upgrade Tyrwhitt House to deliver 21st century clinical services to those suffering from the wounds inflicted by 21st century warfare, who deserve the very best."

Read more about Combat Stress

The Combined Services Disabled Ski Team (CSDST) is open to serving members of the Armed Forces with a permanent disability. This ongoing fund is used to provide transport and equipment in order to get members of the Armed Forces on the slope and caters for beginner levels to advanced.

PRCs will provide a launch pad to life for seriously wounded or long term sick service personnel.

We are delighted to announce that we have committed £147m to the creation of 4 Recovery Centres in Plymouth, Tidworth, Colchester and Catterick. Plymouth, Tidworth and Catterick are already operating at an interim capacity while Colchester will welcome the first lot of wounded, injured and sick when it is fully operational in Spring 2012. Catterick will be fully operational in early 2013, Colchester in spring 2012, Plymouth by the start of 2013 and Tedworth House in Tidworth will be able to house 50 residents by November 2012.
Find out more . . .about the Plymouth PRC

We allocated the first £8M to helping provide the new swimming pool and gym complex at DMRC Headley Court.

Work on the H4H Complex began officially on 11th December 2008 when the Secretary of State for Defence, John Hutton and H4H Co Founder Bryn Parry dug the first turf. The new building was opened in 2010 by HRH Prince William, the Complex has a superb swimming pool, gym and research centre.

Visit the Headley Court website here.

Heroes Haven provides injured Armed Forces personnel and their carers with the chance of a holiday in their fully adapted log cabin in Swanage.

Help for Heroes have provided a grant of £10,000 which will be used to assist with the funding of building the cabin and for groundwork preparation of the site.

Horseback UK is a charity that has been created to provide a recovery capability to aid those wounded in the service of their country. Combining equine therapy, nature therapy and adventure training, Horseback provides part of the rehabilitation process for serving personnel and veterans from the UK military.

Our funds, £50k, will be used to purchase additional equipment and improve current facilities to support forthcoming courses for injured servicemen, to help with their recovery.

The Individual Recovery Programme Fund. (£15m)

The Individual Recovery Programmes (IRPs) are for those whose injuries mean that they will have to move on into civilian life. We have committed a further £5m each year (£3.75m for the Army) to support the IRPs. Typically, this fund will be used to enhance the resettlement package already available to Servicemen as they leave and to help give them every chance at a successful future. As with the QRF, this will be administered by each of the Service’s benevolent funds and will be an integral part of the Service’s Individual Recovery Programmes.

The RAF Aeromedical Evacuation (AE) system repatriates Servicemen and women injured in the line of duty from anywhere in the world back to appropriate specialist care in the UK. More often than not, this can involve long periods of time in transit on military air transport designed for utility over comfort. On average a patient is airborne from Op HERRICK for more than 10 hours stopping for only 2 hours in Cyprus whist the aircraft refuels and AE crews change. The majority of AE patients are conscious and anything that may take their mind off their injuries and reassure them that people are there to support their rehabilitation will help make the journey go quicker. As well as this, the distraction the packs and their contents will create will help take their mind off pain and nausea.

The grant will be used for the cost of these welfare packs and equipment to make the repatriation of patients back to the UK as comfortable as possible.

A grant of £160,000 was awarded to the NFA and ring-fenced for those injured post 9/11.

Some of the grant was specifically allocated to support the participation of Servicemen and women (including staff carers where necessary) from DRMC Headley Court in organised recreational events, including a proportion of the event overhead.

A donation was made to provide leisure and wellbeing equipment for those at the Edinburgh Personnel Recovery Centre, Erskine House. It was used for things such as computers, books, board games, back packs and waterproof jackets.

PRCs will provide a launch pad to life for seriously wounded or long term sick service personnel.

We are delighted to announce that we have committed £147m to the creation of 4 Recovery Centres in Plymouth, Tidworth, Colchester and Catterick. Plymouth, Tidworth and Catterick are already operating at an interim capacity while Colchester will welcome the first lot of wounded, injured and sick when it is fully operational in Spring 2012. Catterick will be fully operational in early 2013, Colchester in spring 2012, Plymouth by the start of 2013 and Tedworth House in Tidworth will be able to house 50 residents by November 2012.

The H4H funded Erskine Pathfinder in Edinburgh, the first PRC to open, will continue for at least one more year and any requirement for expansion will be reviewed in early 2012.

More about the Personnel Recovery Centres

A grant has been awarded to the Royal Centre for Defence Medicine (RCDM) for top of the range equipment which will be used to benefit the treatment of military patients at the Queen Elizabeth Hospital in Birmingham, which is where all front line casualties are repatriated to when they first come back to the UK.  

The Royal Centre for Defence Medicine is responsible for the care of military patients, has medical staff from all three armed services and works alongside the NHS, providing world class medical care.
 

The grant was used in order to convert an ex-service families accommodation into a Contact House so that families of injured RAF personnel can be near them while at Selly Oak and providing disabled access to the house.

We are delighted to have been able to contribute to this very simple idea. We put £10,000 aside for the Military Liaison Officer’s funds at Selly Oak. That money enables the MLOs to take the patients and their relatives out for a pizza or a curry while they are at Selly Oak and for them to start getting used to being seen in public. It also enables the purchase of ordinary extras for patients and their families such as books and DVDs.

The fund is very simple; the MLOs know what their blokes would benefit from, they have the cash, they do it and that is that; simple but very, very effective.

The H4H grant will create an internship program within Skill Force for wounded servicemen and women suffering from mental or physical injuries sustained in active service. Skill Force is an educational charity that delivers inspiring programmes that increase the numbers of young people entering education, employment and training on leaving school. Instruction and mentoring is provided mainly by ex-armed forces personnel, who develop a close working relationship with their students and help to instil a culture of respect and mutual support.

Learn more about Skill Force here.

We have been delighted to donate £520K to aid the completion of the SSAFA Forces Help ‘Homes from Home’ appeal which now provides relatives' houses at Headley Court and Selly Oak. The houses are fully equipped to be a haven for the relatives of the wounded when they visit their loved ones in hospital and, as the Controller of SSAFA outlines below, they are a place where relatives can recharge their batteries and go back refreshed. It is a great idea by a great charity and we are delighted to be able to help.

"SSAFA Forces Help is delighted to receive the generous donation of £520,000 from Help for Heroes. The money is a significant contribution to our ‘Homes from Home’ appeal and will enable us to provide much needed support to our badly injured Servicemen and women and their families. We are extremely grateful to everyone who has worked so hard to raise money for Help for Heroes. We can assure them that, through SSAFA Forces Help’s new home near Selly Oak Hospital, it will be used to make a real difference to many lives. Families will soon be able to stay at the home and be close to their loved ones at a time when they are needed most."
Major General Andrew Cumming, Controller SSAFA Forces Help

St Dunstan's is a charity that supports blind or visually impaired ex-Servicemen and women throughout the UK, the £1m grant is aimed at assisting the extension of the former North Wales Medical Centre In Llandudno which will be converted to create a state of the art rehabilitation centre, that will also provide training and respite for those injured. It will have 40 bedrooms, a dining room, two lounges, a gymnasium, workshop as well as the first class rehabilitation complex.

Help for Heroes has leased the building for £1 a year for the next 99 years. A 17m renovation is being carried out and the first group of personnel started to make use of the facilities and begin the residential courses in July 2011. By September 2012, it will be operating at full capacity and able to sleep 50 residents. Find out more

We are really excited to announce a new partnership with the Prince’s trust, with a grant enabling wounded soldiers to participate in bespoke secondments with the Prince’s Trust Team Programme. The grant will also cover a post within the Partnerships Team that will be filled by a wounded soldier.

Both full-time and part-time secondments will be available and will be tailored to the individuals’ requirements, developing the skills they deem most important. All individuals will receive a certificate for their achievements, a detailed report, and the opportunity to work towards a variety of qualifications.

In every case, the secondee will be in a sympathetic and supportive environment gaining experience, training and qualifications, all of which will benefit them greatly whether they are intending on returning to the workplace, or progressing into civilian street.

We donated £50,000 to Troop Aid, a wonderful group of volunteers who supply goodies to the hospital at Selly Oak to make a wounded patient's life a little better. The funding meant their service was even more effective and that every patient injured while on active service received a Troop Aid Hero Grab Bag. The bag contains all the 'nice to haves' like a t-shirt, underwear, socks, washing and shaving kit (or female equivalent) as well as other items like writing paper, a telephone card and memory stick.

The Union Jack Club is a private members club for serving and ex-serving military personnel of Her Majesty's Armed Forces. The H4H grant has meant that four rooms can be converted to accommodate those with disabilities and one room to provide additional accommodation for a carer.

The Victory Services Club is s Tri-Service, all ranks Members' Club for currently Serving and Retired members of the Armed Forces. The grant has gone towards refurbishing several rooms in order to accommodate those with disabilities.

Winston's Wish provides support for bereaved children and young people up to the age of 18. They also support their parents or carers. The £100,000 grant will be used to develop a bereavement support programme for Forces families across the UK with children up to 18 years old who have been affected by the death of a sibling or parent who has been killed in conflict.