Woman who spent a month in a coma reunites with paramedics who saved her

Astrid Zegers had not even left her street on her motorbike when she was hit by and trapped under a mini-van.

The collision broke all but one of Ms Zegers' ribs, as well as her neck, pelvis and shoulder blade. She also suffered severe brain swelling.

Six years later, she has reunited with the paramedics and police officers who were first on the scene.

"I am super grateful to be able to individually meet them all and thank them for all the things they did on that day," Ms Zegers said.

"The paramedics are amazing people, especially for an incident like that, that's so severe."

Ms Zegers still gets emotional thinking of the accident, but hopes that meeting with the people involved will help her move forward in her healing.

"It's like part of therapy. It's a traumatic moment in your life. It's like a hurdle. You have to overcome that to move forward with the race which is life," she said.

The mother of two children, who were 13 and 15 at the time of the crash, hopes that the reunion will help the paramedics who saved her to move forward.

"It's very important, if you can as a survivor, to try and find the people that helped and pay it forward and thank them."

"It's hard for them, for the police and the paramedics. They need all the support they can get, and I'm happy to give it to them."

Fran Nadin had only been a paramedic for seven or eight months when she responded to the collision which put Ms Zegers in a coma.

"It was my first ever car accident with someone that injured. Those jobs stay with you. You relive them. They become a part of you," she said.

Ms Zegers said reuniting with patients can help first responders to stop wondering what happened afterwards.

"You spend incredibly intimate moments with people. When people die, when people are born, those are sacred moments in most cultures," she said.

"Sharing that intimacy with someone and never seeing them again, it's very, very hard. A lot of the time people struggle with that lack of closing the loop."

Ultimately, however, Ms Nadin said it was up to the patient.

'It's about the patient and what the patient wants, but I think it is beneficial to understand what happened to you, who were the people that were there and what they did," she said.

Ms Nadin said in the aftermath of the accident, she was able to rely on her colleagues for support.

"We all know how it feels. People came and took me out for coffee. We went for walks with their dogs.

"We all support each other."

Ms Zegers said the final step she needs to take to close the loop on the accident is talking to the driver of the mini-van that hit her.

She said she has reached out to the driver, but is understanding that he doesn't want to see her.

"Just to talk, to find out how he's going, how it happened, what happened - so then I can forgive, forget and move on," she said.

"Anyone can have an accident. It would just be nice to be able to talk to him, but that might be for the future."

Ms Zeger has recently had her motorbike licence restored and hopes to take her first journey in six years in the next few weeks.

"I used to love caravanning, so I bought a caravan and hope to do a little journey to Bathurst," she said.