A TENBY pensioner suffered significant facial injuries after tripping on an unmarked kerb blamed on Pembrokeshire County Council’s “disgusting oversight”.

Shortly before 2pm on August 16, Anne Hughes tripped on a kerb outside County Sports, Haverfordwest, and fell, landing on her face.

Anne was tended by a local couple, Al and Beth. They then contacted her daughter Crystal, who works in Tenby and immediately closed her place of work for the day when she heard the news of the fall. When she arrived on the scene she found her mother in a deep sense of shock and bloodied, with her two front teeth hanging from the sockets.

“My mother then spent the rest of the day in A&E having brain scans and pain relief,” said Crystal, who was told that her mother must not be left alone for at least 24 hours as she was suffering a severe concussion and the loosened teeth could come fully dislodged, presenting a choke risk. 

“Once we arrived at my home, despite being heavily sedated she was in severe pain.”

Having been told by a neighbour, who is a dentist, that there would be no saving the teeth and that Anne needed an emergency extraction, Crystal took her mother to the West Wales Dental Implant Clinic and she had the emergency procedure at around 11.30pm. Recovery will be a long process and Anne will have to have dentures fitted until she is healed enough to have implants.

In an email to the Council, with Henry Tufnell MP and others copied in, Crystal said she will not rest until the “clear and present danger to life and limb” has been fixed.

“The injury to my mother was severe, lasting and upsetting, not to mention the fact of the cost of the emergency dental work and future costs of necessary dental implants.

“I think this is a disgusting oversight on the council’s part, when a clear trip hazard has been reported but not marked and is causing danger to the public.”

We asked Pembrokeshire County Council various questions about the site, pavement maintenance and the availability of compensation, to which a spokesman replied: “We were very sorry to hear about the incident and the injuries suffered by Mrs Hughes and the Council has been in contact with Mrs Hughes’ family. As a claim has been logged it would not be appropriate to comment further at this time.”