16 March 2022
An appeal is being made to knitters to help create blankets for patients at high risk of falls, for while they are staying at Shropshire’s acute hospitals.
The Falls Prevention Team at The Shrewsbury and Telford Hospital NHS Trust (SaTH) is looking for people to knit or donate the blankets to use in a trial.
It is hoped the blankets will serve as a visual cue to staff that a patient is at greater risk of falls, and therefore requires closer observation.
Blankets need to be bright yellow – the themed colour for falls prevention – and must be approximately 1m x 1m in size with no loose threads.
Due to infection control, the blankets are single-use items and will be taken home with the patient when they are discharged. They must be knitted using new wool, or if anyone is planning to donate blankets, they will need to be brand new.
Please note this is a separate request to the brightly-coloured blankets required for Dementia patients.
Leeanne Morgan, Falls Prevention Practitioner at SaTH, said: “The Trust has received a good response to similar appeals in the past so we are asking for people’s support again, to help our patients who are at higher risk of falling.
“Similar schemes have proved successful at other hospitals so we’re hoping to roll this out at the Royal Shrewsbury Hospital (RSH) and the Princess Royal Hospital (PRH) in Telford following our trial.
“The blankets will be hugely valuable in improving the safety of our patients, so we would love for local knitters to get behind this.
“Purchasing the blankets is also quite costly, so this will be a more cost-effective way for us to test out the idea.”
Donations can be sent to Leeanne Morgan, Falls Prevention Practitioner at Royal Shrewsbury Hospital.
For more information please email leeanne.morgan@nhs.net