Fall Prevention in Long Term Care Facilities

1825 Words4 Pages
bulb-icon

Recommended: Essay of critiques of findings of fall prevention articles

At Diversicare Rehabilitation, DVCR, between the months of May and July, there were fifty-two falls. Of these falls, twenty-two resulted in major injuries and were reportable to state. All the reportable falls resulted in a form of injury. The injuries noted were ten hip fractures, five femur, three shoulder and four elbow fractures. Out of all the falls, twelve falls with major injuries occurred to residents who had suffered a fall within the past week. Two falls were reportable to the coroner but they were both ruled non-related. In this project, there will be a review of the causes of falls at DVCR. The project will review main reasons why this is such a problem at this facility. The project will focus on the preventable falls and those that may have been avoided. There will be recommendations to prevent falls and an evaluation will be done to determine whether the recommendations are effective in preventing falls. Falls in nursing homes residents are associated with morbidity, mortality, and healthcare costs. The centers for Medicare and Medicaid indicate falls as the quality indicator. (Leland, Gozalo, Teno, Mor, 2012). Factors such as new environment, medication, cognition, and non-compliance contribute to falls. A significant number of falls occur from wheelchairs. (Willy, 2013). Newly admitted residents to long-term care facilities are confused with the change. The new environment and the new unfamiliar faces increase the level of anxiety. Pain may also contribute to falls. In order to take tailor made preventative measures, fall risk factors for each resident should be evaluated periodically. Tools scoring risk factors can be utilized. In long-term care, falls are the most dreaded events. Falls, especially those resultin... ... middle of paper ... ...geriatrics society, 60(5), 939-945. doi: 1532-5415.2012.03931.x Papas, E., & Cluxton, R. J. (2011). Vitamin D: beneficial for pain, fracture, and falls in long-term care residents?. Annals of long term care, 19(5), 33-36. Risk factors for falls in older people in nursing homes and hospitals. A systematic review and meta-analysis. Archives of gerontology & geriatrics, 56(3), 407-415. doi:10.1016/j.archger.2012.12.006 Sterke, C. S., Ziere, G., van Beeck, E. F., Looman, C. N., & Van Der Cammen, T. M. (2012). Dose-response relationship between selective serotonin re-uptake inhibitors and injurious falls: a study in nursing home residents with dementia. British journal of clinical pharmacology, 73(5), 812-820. doi:10.1111/j.1365-2125.2011.04124.x Willy, B. (2013). Gravity assisted seating: Prevention of wheelchair related falls in nursing homes. Gerinotes, 20(2), 8-10.

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

    The National Patient Safety Goal (NPSG) for falls in long term care facilities is to identify which patients are at risk for falling and to take action to prevent falls for these residents. (NPSG.09.02.01). There are five elements of performance for NPSG: 1. Assess the risk for falls, 2. Implement interventions to reduce falls based on the resident’s assessed risk, 3. Educate staff on the fall reduction program in time frames determined by the organization, 4. Educate the resident and, as needed, the family on any individualized fall reduction strategies, and 5. Evaluate the effectiveness of all fall reduction activities, including assessment,

    Read More

  • Falls Risk Assessment Case Study

    1214 Words  | 3 Pages

    The nurse would firstly identify if Mrs Jones is at risk of falls by conducting a falls risk assessment using an evaluation tool such as the Peninsula Health Falls Risk Assessment Tool (FRAT) (ACSQHC, 2009). The falls risk assessment enables the nurse to identify any factors that may increase the risk of falls (ACSQHC, 2009). The falls risk assessment tool focuses on areas such as recent falls and past history of falls; psychological status for example, depression and anxiety; cognitive status; medications including diuretics, anti-hypertensives, anti-depressants, sedatives, anti-Parkinson’s and hypnotics; as well as taking into account any problems in relation to vision, mobility, behaviours, environment, nutrition, continence and activities

    Read More

  • Environmental Modifications to Avoid Elderly Falls

    886 Words  | 2 Pages

    Environmental modifications is a highly recommendable approach which prevents falls and injury’s from occurring. The main approach in this strategy is reducing injury and falls from recognizing and removing environmental hazards. Some hazard reducing modifications consisted of removing extension cords from the base, removing loose mats, and putting in handles on the rampart. Even though this approach is recommendable the effects are not fully established. In this clause, a written report was conducted to provide evidence to clinics, which bears out the effectiveness of environmental modifications.

    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

  • Keep Patients Safe By Reducing Accidental Falls

    1197 Words  | 3 Pages

    Based on the review of previous falls, the statistics indicate that falls and patient injuries have decreased from the previous year by ten percent. By utilizing evidence-based practice and synthesis of internal and external evidence the fall prevention program proved to be effective and results in increased patient safety and improved overall patient outcomes.

    Read More

  • Tai Chi and the Elderly

    2260 Words  | 5 Pages

    Gillespie LD, Robertson MC, Gillespie WJ, et al. Interventions for preventing falls in older people living in the community. The Cochrane database of systematic reviews. 2012;9:CD007146.

    Read More

  • Prevention of Patient Falls

    1134 Words  | 3 Pages

    Patient falls is one of the commonest events within the healthcare facilities that affect the safety of the patients. Preventing falls among patients requires various methods. Recognition, evaluation, and preventing of patient falls are great challenges for healthcare workers in providing a safe environment in any healthcare setting. Hospitals have come together to understand the contributing factors of falls, and to decrease their occurrence and resulting injuries or death. Risk of falls among patients is considered as a safety indicator in healthcare institutions due to this. Falls and related injuries have consistently been associated with the quality of nursing care and are included as a nursing-quality indicator monitored by the American Nurses Association, National Database of Nursing Quality Indicators and by the National Quality Forum. (NCBI)

    Read More

  • Nursing Care In Nursing Home

    975 Words  | 2 Pages

    To access the rate of falls in nursing home, an outcome measure is selected in this study from the database of National Quality Measures C...

    Read More

  • Elderly Disability

    2491 Words  | 5 Pages

    Because of the growing concern associated with disability in the elderly, many researchers have examined factors that may be associated with the risk disability in the elderly. These factors have ranged widely, including functional limitations6-9, level of physical activity10, 11, depression12-15, cognitive status13, 16, 17, comorbidities18, 19, falls6, 20, self-rated health21, 22, social interaction23 and others24.

    Read More

  • Fall Risk Assessment

    981 Words  | 2 Pages

    In collecting evidence for this project, the database Cinahl was used to extract articles from scholarly journals in the field of nursing. An initial general search was conducted using the combined terms “falls” and “scale” which yielded a handful of articles regarding fall assessment tool. A second search using the term “Morse fall” was conducted to broaden the scope of research, and we were able to make selections from these searches. The Science direct website also provided fast facts on the different falls assessment tools and interventions which were applied to this project. The phenomenon of falls has long been studied in order to develop policies and procedures to decrease the overall number of falls. Meta-analysis

    Read More

  • Falls Among Older Persons with Dementia

    1046 Words  | 3 Pages

    ...th dementia is complex and it needs careful assessments of risk for falls by qualified nursing staff. Ongoing comprehensive assessment, documentation and reporting can prevent fall in older people with dementia. The study shows that the people with dementia are at higher risk for fall and the challenges are increased for the nursing staffs that care for them. Nurses need to assess and understand the patient’s physical needs and provide the appropriate care by helping them with their ADL’s (Struksness et al., 2011).

    Read More

  • Tremors Essay

    997 Words  | 2 Pages

    Preventing Falls Among Older Adults. (2013). Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Retrieved from http://www.cdc.gov/Features/OlderAmericans/

    Read More

  • Fear Of Falling

    947 Words  | 2 Pages

    The frequency of fear of falling in this study was estimated to be between twelve percent and sixty five percent in this community of elderly adults that have actually not previously fallen and between twenty nine and ninety-two percent for those that had actually fallen in the past, with ladies being disproportionately negatively impacted. Fear of falling had actually resulted in reduced exercising, which caused increased delicacy and decreased functional capability, as well as social isolation and decreased high quality of life.

    Read More

More about Fall Prevention in Long Term Care Facilities

Open Document