Fall Prevention Essay

Quality Improvement for Fall Prevention in the Elderly The occurrence of falls among the elderly is related to multiple factors, such as inherent and external issues. Studies have proven that when appropriate intervention is put in place, falls are preventable. A quality improvement according to Polit & Beck (2012) is created to examine the willingness of individuals to understand these studies and put them into practice or to appraise the results of interventions already in place. This paper will

paper will discuss falls prevention in the older adult over the age of 55 and new and alternative interventions for fall prevention compared to current practice. The desired outcome of the paper is to provide information for fall prevention and, therefore, decrease the occurrence of falls. First, in order to understand the importance falls have within the clinical setting, statistics showing the mortality, morbidity and financial impact should be understood. The occurrence of falls within the acute

Fall Prevention: A Workplace Overview According to Zhani (2015), the Joint Commission describes falls with serious injury as one of the top sentinel events reported; defining a sentinel event as, “a patient safety event (not primarily related to the natural course of the patient’s illness or underlying condition) that reaches a patient and results in death, permanent harm or severe temporary harm where intervention is required to sustain life.” Therefore, one could understand the importance of

reduce the inpatient fall incidents. According to Bechdel et al (2014), the top priority of health care organizations nationwide is to reduce and eliminate falls within the clinical care settings. One of the serious problems in acute care hospital is the patient’s fall. The unfamiliar environment, acute and co-morbid illnesses, prolonged bedrest, polypharmacy, and the placement of tubes and catheters are common challenges that place patients at risk of falling. Most of the falls that I have encountered

Assignment 5- Prevention of Falls Kortney Franco Kaplan University NU 416- Nursing Care of the Older Adult 07/30/2014 Assignment 5- Prevention of falls When dealing with the elderly population it’s important to make sure they are cared for properly. Usually by this age it is hard for the elderly adult to care for themselves and need extra help around the house or need help with activities of daily living. Usually elderly patients are very resistant to getting help because

I am going to focus on a particular and an effective intervention for fall prevention in aged care facilities, which is medication review. According to Australian Commission on Safety and Quality in Health Care (2009, p. 72), almost all of residents in aged care facilities are prescribed one medication and more than 60% of residents are prescribed 4 or more medications, 47% taking psychoactive drugs regularly, 11% taking sedatives regularly and 21% taking antidepressants regularly. Polypharmacy is

although most of the time falls are not serious, some can be life-threatening. Falls are a danger to both physical and psychological well-being because they may diminish a person’s ability to maintain an active and independent lifestyle.1 There are many factors that place individuals at risk for falls such as age, muscle weakness, difficulty with balance or walking, psychological diagnosis, and several medical conditions.1,2 Approximately one-third of people over the age of 65 fall at least once a year

will decrease the number of work related injuries. More than 16 percent of all disabling work-related injuries are the results of falls. (Gortsch, 2011) The best prevention of falls is to figure out what causes the falls, and to develop a guard system that will increase safety awareness and lower the number of injuries. A proactive approach for the prevention of falls is to know the primary causes that led up to these injuries. Inquiries like, was there a foreign object on the surface, or a design

Safety/Fall Prevention Who needs to be concerned about safety? Safety strategies to protect your bones are important for individuals of all ages. It is imperative for everyone to protect their bones and overall health by wearing seatbelts in any moving vehicle and by using appropriate protective equipment when participating in sports. If you have been diagnosed with osteoporosis, you may be more likely to break a bone as a result of a fall. In fact, most broken bones happen as a result of a fall

likelihood of a fall during the hospitalization (Cox et al., 2015). Moreover, cardiovascular comorbidities, neuro/musculoskeletal disease, evening shift, implementation of fall prevention strategies, and a higher RN-to-unlicensed assistive personnel (UAP) staffing ratio (RN/UAP) were significantly and independently associated with a decreased likelihood of a fall during the hospitalization. Additionally, the initiation of fall prevention strategies following a prescribed fall prevention protocol was