Valerie Taylor

Who is Valerie Taylor?

Valerie Taylor is a British born physiotherapist and philanthropist, living in Dhaka, Bangladesh. She is the founder and driving personality of the Centre for the Rehabilitation of the Paralysed. Though British by citizenship, she has spent most of her working in Bangladesh, treating and rehabilitating poor Bangladeshis suffering from neurological disorders. She received citizenship of Bangladesh in the year of 1998 from the then Awami League administration.

Valerie Taylor began taking an interest in caring for the paralyzed in Bangladesh when she saw what she felt was negligence and failure of society to care for patients suffering from spinal injuries. She arrived in 1969, under contract for 15 months under the volunteer charity organization Voluntary Service Overseas, briefly leaving during the Bangladesh Liberation War. Though she was only obliged to serve for 15 months, she made a personal decision to devote herself to the cause of serving the paralyzed in Bangladesh. At the start of her career, she was running her center with only four patients in what was then an abandoned warehouse of the Shaheed Suhrawardy Hospital. Since then, the CRP has grown to include a 100-bed hospital, in addition to providing other rehabilitation treatments. The center includes recreational services including a swimming pool, and sports areas. The center also provides vocational training so that the poorer patients can learn income-generating skills that can be performed while in their physical condition.*