Welcome to Falls Prevention

“A fall is defined as an unintentional or unexpected loss of balance resulting in coming to rest on the floor, the ground, or an object below knee level” (NICE 2017)

A fall can be devastating. The human cost of falls and the impact includes distress, pain, and injury, loss of confidence, loss of independence, increased morbidity and mortality. Falling also affects family members and carers of people who fall, and has an impact on quality of life, health and social costs.

Falls represents significant costs to trusts and the wider healthcare systems, with annual total costs to the NHS alone from falls among older people estimated by the national Institute for health and care excellence (NICE) in 2015 at £2.23 billion.

We know that falls are the most commonly reported type of patient safety incident in healthcare and represents the most frequent type of accident in people aged 65 and over. We know that one in three people over 65 will experience a fall this year, unfortunately the risk of falling increases as we age, half of all people over 80 will fall at least once a year.

Our Quality Matron, Clare Walsgrove (clare.walsgrove@nhs.net or ext 2525) works alongside Quality & Safety, Patient Safety and Health & Safety to improve the care and stay of the patient whilst in hospital.

Tackling the problem of in-patient falls is challenging for staff, but research has shown multiple interventions performed by multidisciplinary teams can help to address risk factors and reduce falls. From this we are able to put in place support to help the patient.