The Social Work Service at Slater & Gordon is in a unique position to support people with mesothelioma and their family members as they navigate the legal system and seek compensation. Making a claim is usually important for the person with mesothelioma as they are often angered by their situation and want to seek restitution for the injustice done to them and ease current or future financial burdens for their families.

It is quite common for people affected by mesothelioma to feel angry at the producers of asbestos, or at past employers for having to work in environments that exposed them to asbestos. People commonly express randomised anger, towards others who were more fortunate. Many bereaved families also feel their grief is complicated by anger, knowing that this death and many others were preventable. A number of bereaved people have described their family member as having been ‘murdered’ rather than dying of cancer.

We have found that the clients and their families referred to us have not been accessing any support services available to them, and as a result are often isolated in their grief and anger. Our service aims to reduce this isolation, by providing regular telephone contact and counselling, and case work to link people in with their community. A network of support is subsequently developed for clients and families to assist them through their complex grief experience.

Clients and their families often report that the combination of the pursuit of justice and the social work support provided are what keeps them going. By providing social work support in a setting that it is not traditionally found in, we are able to meet the needs of cancer patients who would otherwise have fallen through a gap in service delivery.