TY - JOUR
T1 - Factors associated with falls in hospitalized adult patients
AU - Cox, Jill
AU - Thomas-Hawkins, Charlotte
AU - Pajarillo, Edmund
AU - DeGennaro, Susan
AU - Cadmus, Edna
AU - Martinez, Miguel
N1 - Publisher Copyright:
© 2014 Elsevier Inc.
PY - 2015/5/1
Y1 - 2015/5/1
N2 - Introduction: Despite efforts in hospitals to identify patients at risk for falls and to prevent these incidents, falls among hospitalized patients are not a rare event and continue to be a major health care concern, occurring in approximately 700,000-1,000,000 hospitalized patients per year. Purpose: The purpose of this study was to examine intrinsic, extrinsic, and workforce factors that contribute to falls among hospitalized adult patients. Methods: A retrospective correlational design was used to examine 160 patients admitted to a medical-surgical unit over the year 2012. Analytical weighting was applied to the study sample to conduct bivariate and multivariate analysis. Findings: In multivariate analysis, the variables age, narcotic/sedative use, and overnight shift, significantly predicted the likelihood of a fall during the hospitalization. Cardiovascular disease, neuromusculoskeletal disease, evening shift, the implementation of fall prevention strategies and higher RN to unlicensed assistive personnel staffing ratios decreased the likelihood of a fall during the hospitalization. In addition, patients at high risk for falls using the Hendrich I fall scale were nearly 17% more likely to fall during the hospitalization. Conclusions: Many factors influence the occurrence of a fall in hospitalized patients. Fall risk assessment and the implementation of fall prevention strategies are both effective strategies in the clinical area to identify and decrease the probability of a fall. The presence of the RN is significant in fall prevention in medical-surgical patients.
AB - Introduction: Despite efforts in hospitals to identify patients at risk for falls and to prevent these incidents, falls among hospitalized patients are not a rare event and continue to be a major health care concern, occurring in approximately 700,000-1,000,000 hospitalized patients per year. Purpose: The purpose of this study was to examine intrinsic, extrinsic, and workforce factors that contribute to falls among hospitalized adult patients. Methods: A retrospective correlational design was used to examine 160 patients admitted to a medical-surgical unit over the year 2012. Analytical weighting was applied to the study sample to conduct bivariate and multivariate analysis. Findings: In multivariate analysis, the variables age, narcotic/sedative use, and overnight shift, significantly predicted the likelihood of a fall during the hospitalization. Cardiovascular disease, neuromusculoskeletal disease, evening shift, the implementation of fall prevention strategies and higher RN to unlicensed assistive personnel staffing ratios decreased the likelihood of a fall during the hospitalization. In addition, patients at high risk for falls using the Hendrich I fall scale were nearly 17% more likely to fall during the hospitalization. Conclusions: Many factors influence the occurrence of a fall in hospitalized patients. Fall risk assessment and the implementation of fall prevention strategies are both effective strategies in the clinical area to identify and decrease the probability of a fall. The presence of the RN is significant in fall prevention in medical-surgical patients.
KW - Falls
KW - Hospitalized adults
KW - Risk factors
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U2 - 10.1016/j.apnr.2014.12.003
DO - 10.1016/j.apnr.2014.12.003
M3 - Article
C2 - 25908542
AN - SCOPUS:84928042620
VL - 28
SP - 78
EP - 82
JO - Applied Nursing Research
JF - Applied Nursing Research
SN - 0897-1897
IS - 2
ER -