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Learning Objective 1: The learner will be able to understand the related factors of the occurrence of falls of hospitalized patients.
Learning Objective 2: The learner will be able to understand to set up strategies for reducing the incidents of fall.
The purpose of this study is to explore and understand the related factors of the occurrence of falls of hospitalized patients and to set up strategies for reducing the incidents of fall.
Methods:
This study used a retrospective method of file analysis. The subjects under study were 54 patients with reported records of fall in a regional hospital in Southern Taiwan during the period of time from December 2010 to May 2011. The variables being analyzed were gender, age, divisions of hospitalization, disease diagnosed, place of fall, activity involved while falling, time of fall, gradation of fall, factors of fall. Improvement strategies were planned afterwards.
Results:
The major findings of this study were as follows: gender/male (65.5%), and age/70 to 79 (25.9%); division of hospitalization / internal medicine (78.6%); diagnosed disease/urinary and digestive system (69.6%); place of fall/ the ward (58.1%); activity involved while falling/walking (25.9%); time of fall/12AM to 8AM (41.0%); no injury(84.4%)more than injured; injury/ grade 1 injury(32.1%); factor of fall/leg weakness(57.1%).By means of cause analysis, the improvement strategies were as follows. Holding medical conferences on preventing patients from falling, cross-team involvement of reviewing and preventing patients from falling again; holding continuing education courses for preventing patients from falling, strengthening clinical care knowledge, teaching rehabilitation skills, regularly monitoring nurses’ fall preventing practice, and strengthening the correctness of clinical work, all of these strategies were executed to ensure the safety of patients.
Conclusion:
The study results can help improve nurses’s understanding on the related factors of falls of hospitalized patients, and help develop and set up the intervening strategies especially helped those patients who have weak legs. The improvement strategies can reduce the percentage of hospitalized patients’ falls and enhance the caring quality.