Ask Your Child's Risk For Falls Essay

499 Words1 Page
bulb-icon

Recommended: Fall prevention overview

WHAT ARE SOME SAFETY TIPS FOR PREVENTING FALLS?
Ask your health care provider about your child’s risk of falling. Find out if any of your child’s medicines or treatments cause dizziness or affect balance. Make a plan with your health care provider to keep your child safe from falls. The plan may include:
• Having your child ask for help to move around at any time, especially after surgery or if he or she feels unwell.
• Having your child ask for help to get objects that are out of reach.
• Keeping the floor clean. Remove all clutter from the sides of beds and cribs.
• Keeping the bed locked in the low position.
• Keeping the side rails up at all times, unless someone is providing care.
• Making sure that the nurse call button is within reach. …show more content…

• Using the provided safety straps with infant carriers, strollers, car seats, and wheelchairs.
• Keeping equipment and wires away from children as much as possible.
• Setting up a fall alert system.

WHY IS MY CHILD AT RISK FOR FALLS?
As a hospital patient, your child’s condition and treatments may increase your child’s risk for falls. Some additional risk factors for falls in a hospital include:
• Being in an unfamiliar environment.
• Being on bed rest.
• Surgery.
• Taking certain medicines.
• Tubing requirements, such as intravenous (IV) therapy or catheters.

WHAT DOES THE HOSPITAL STAFF DO TO HELP PREVENT MY CHILD FROM FALLING?
Hospital staff has a plan in place to help prevent falls and accidents. The hospital’s plan may include:
• Completing an individual risk assessment for your child.
• Communicating with your child and your family about fall risk and prevention.
• Adhering to safety guidelines when helping your child move around.
• Cleaning routinely.
• Removing unnecessary equipment or tubes.
• Using safety equipment. Equipment that can help prevent falls includes:
• Walkers, crutches, and other walking devices.
• Safety rails on beds and cribs.
• Hand rails in

Show More
Related

  • The Joint Commission: National Patient Safety Goals for Medicare Based Long Term Care

    1595 Words  | 4 Pages

    Jones, D., & Whitaker, T. (2011). Preventing falls in older people: assessment and interventions. Nursing Standard, 25(52), 50-55.

    Read More

  • Falls Risk

    1387 Words  | 3 Pages

    It is important that key factors in determining who is and who is not a risk to fall are sought out by the health care team. In this paper we will focus on how to determine who is a fall risk.

    Read More

  • Patient Falls Case Study

    1329 Words  | 3 Pages

    Patient falls in the hospital is a serious issue and challenging problem that could lead to prolonged hospital stay, longer recovery time for patients, increased costs for hospitals, and a source of distress and anxiety for patients, nurses, and families. Patient falls can cause minor or major serious physical injury depending on the situation and the age of the client. In addition to the physical harms, patients can suffer from psychological injuries which make them lose their independence and confidence on themselves and build a lot of anger, distress and fears of falling.

    Read More

  • Prevention of Falls and Fall Injuries in the Older Adult

    1440 Words  | 3 Pages

    Registered Nurses’ Association of Ontario (RNAO). (2005). Prevention of falls and fall injuries in the older adult. Retrieved from http://rnao.ca/sites/rnao-ca/files/Prevention_of_Falls_and_Fall_Injuries_in_the_Older_Adult.pdf

    Read More

  • Fall Prevention In Nursing Essay

    898 Words  | 2 Pages

    Fall can lead to serious injuries and death which, increase the health care cost. Hence prevention of fall is an important public health issue in the hospital for patient safety. We had many falls incidents reported in our unit every month. Therefore, it is essential to implement prevention strategies through multidimensional approach by interdisciplinary team. Through the proposed fall management program, we can reduce fall rate drastically.

    Read More

  • Nurse’s Duty in Fall Prevention Especially in Patients Undergoing Hemodialysis

    822 Words  | 2 Pages

    Falls can happen at any time and place in a hospital setting. It is a major patient safety issue causing injury, distress and even death. According to Debra Hain (2012), “In 2010, there were 2.35 million emergency room visits for non-fatal injuries in older adults with over 25% requiring hospitalization” (pg. 251). Falls can interrupt a person’s quality of life but also have a financial effect on the healthcare system (Hain, 2012). Falls are preventable and in order to reduce the rates for falls nurses must be more vigilant in their assessments to identify patients that are at risk, especially for those undergoing hemodialysis.

    Read More

  • Patient Fall Prevention

    2176 Words  | 5 Pages

    A fall is an “untoward event which results in the patient coming to rest unintentionally on the ground” (Morris & Isaacs, 1980). When it comes to patient safety in health care, there isn’t any subject that takes precedence. Patient falls are a major cause for concern in the health industry, particularly in an acute-care setting such as a hospital where a patient’s mental and physical well being may already be compromised. Not only do patient falls increase the length of hospital stays, but it has a major impact on the economics of health care with adjusted medical costs related to falls averaging in the range of 30 billion dollars per year (Center for Disease Control [CDC], 2013). Patient falls are a common phenomenon seen most often in the elderly population. One out of three adults, aged 65 or older, fall each year (CDC, 2013). Complications of falls are quite critical in nature and are the leading cause of both fatal and nonfatal injuries including traumatic brain injuries and fractures. A huge solution to this problem focuses on prevention and education to those at risk. ...

    Read More

  • Prevention of Falls in Hospitalized Older Adults

    2941 Words  | 6 Pages

    Yates K. M., & Creech Tart. (2012). Acute care patient falls: evaluation of a revised fall

    Read More

  • Fall Prevention Essay

    1070 Words  | 3 Pages

    Fall prevention is one of the biggest safety concerns regarding geriatric and pediatric patients in a health care setting. Falls occur almost every day in hospitals and nursing home settings because of a variety of reasons, from weak bones and throw rugs to toys lying in the floor. Tumbles can have grave effects on a child because they tend to play and not pay attention to their surroundings which causes them to take a spill. The consequences can be even worse for an older adult that suffers a fall giving their age and health concerns, this gives the elderly a disadvantage when falls transpire. Most people can help prevent falls from occurring but OTs (Occupational Therapist) are an elite group of people with knowledge and skills that train,

    Read More

  • Prevention of Patient Falls

    1134 Words  | 3 Pages

    When taking steps to analyze and apply intervention strategies for falls, we must examine the factors that cause these occurrences. There are numerous reasons that falls occur, such as intrinsic and or extrinsic risk factors. Intrinsic risk factors for falls may be due to changes that are part of the normal aging process and acute or chronic conditions. According to Zheng, Pan and Hua et al. (2013), about 35-45 percent of individuals who are usually older than 65 years and other 50 percent of the elderly individuals report cases of fall every year. Extrinsic factors are those related to physical environment such as lack of grab bars, poor condition of floor surfaces, inadequate or improper use of assistive devices (Currie). Patient falls is not an easy thing to eliminate. With many clinical challenges, there’s no easy answer to the challenges posed by patient falls; howe...

    Read More

  • Essay On Fall Prevention

    1958 Words  | 4 Pages

    The purpose of this paper was to correlate the relation between patient falls and implementation of STEEEP, safe, timely, effective, efficient, equitable, and patient-centered (Institute of Medicine, 2014). Safety was first addressed through assessment of patients to recognize those at an increased risk for falls and implementing interventions as outlined by hospital policy. The intervention must be timely in that it is implemented upon admission of the patient to the facility to ensure effectiveness. Following the hospital policy in regards to application of an armband for fall risk, identifiable socks, utilization of equipment such as bed alarms and appropriate signage provides a checklist to maintain efficiency of the prescribed interventions. Education about falls and its prevention assists patients in understanding the importance of alerting staff prior to ambulation to reduce the potential to fall. This includes the patient in the plan of care and provides patient-centered care.

    Read More

  • Falls Prevention

    655 Words  | 2 Pages

    Falls are the leading cause of injuries, disabilities, and deaths among community-dwelling older adults (Moyer, 2012). According to the Center for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC, 2016), each year one out of three community-dwelling older adults aged 65 years or above falls at least once. There is a need to identify effective interventions pertinent to the primary-care setting to prevent falls among older adults living in the community. The guideline titled “Prevention of falls in community-dwelling older adults: U.S. Preventive Services Task Force recommendation statement” is focused on determining the effectiveness and harms of different fall-prevention interventions relevant to primary care for adults aged 65 years or above (Moyer,

    Read More

  • Fall Prevention Research Paper

    818 Words  | 2 Pages

    While about 5 percent of adults over the age of 65 live in nursing facilities, they account for nearly 20 percent of fall-related deaths in this age group. Up to 20 percent of residents who fall sustain serious injuries that can lead to a decline in functional ability and mobility impairment. The Best Practice Guidelines consist of broad principles upon which standard procedures for individual health services can be based. The guidelines aim intended to assist service providers in developing and implementing standard policies and procedures in the area of falls prevention. Best practice guidelines can be successfully implemented only where there is adequate planning, resources, organizational and administrative support, as well as appropriate

    Read More

  • Steps At A Strategic Action Plan

    1526 Words  | 4 Pages

    Assessing the reason for the falls would be the first step in the plan. Is there any repetition of the reason behind the fall (Olrich, Kalman, & Nigolian, 2012)? For instance, is there frequent falls at a certain time of the day such as during shift change? Also it may be helpful to know if the fall was related to tethers such as IV poles or Foley catheters. It may also be a good idea to look at the type of patient who fell, is the patient reported to be confused at the time of the fall? Is there any history of dementia reported for the patient that fell? Once all the information is gathered then the pertinent information could be categorized into groups that would help to decipher the best plan of action to prevent falls. The plan would need to be written and approved by the nursing managers and may be put into place by the clinical leaders that are involved with the unit. Although each unit is different some of the ways to prevent falls are similar in all units in the hospital and a team should be formed that would use the inf...

    Read More

  • Fall And Fall Essay

    1609 Words  | 4 Pages

    Fall is sudden, unpredicted, unintentional occurrence resulting in-patient landing on ground or at lower level. Falls and fall related injuries incur cost for the patient as well as the health cares system. The fall has a significant impact in patient quality of life and usually fall has many reasons to happen. Thus, preventing falls among patients in healthcare settings requires a complex approach, and recognition, evaluation and prevention of patient falls are significant challenges. Falls are a common cause of injury and the leading cause of nonfatal injuries and trauma-related hospitalizations in the United States (Barton, 2009). Falls occur in all types of healthcare institutions and to all patient populations. Up to 12% of hospitalized patients fall at least once during their hospital stay (Kalisch, Tschannen, & Lee, 2012). It has been using different strategies in many hospitals to prevent or at least to decrease the incidence of fall. However, the number of falls in the hospitals increases at alarming rate in the nation. The hospitals try to implement more efficient intervention strategies, but the number fall increase instead of decrease. In fact, many interventions to prevent falls and fall-related injuries require organized support and effective implementation for specific at risk and vulnerable subpopulations, such as the frail elderly and those at risk for injury.

    Read More

More about Ask Your Child's Risk For Falls Essay

Open Document