Preventing Falls in Care Homes: a Question of Balance

An interesting reflection on the problems of preventing falls in care homes from Kate Robertson and Alex Macdonald highlights the conflict of interest between care home staff wanting to keep residents safe from falls and them not leading healthy lives. The problem stems from the fact that all care home residents are at a much higher risk of falls and that care home staff often limit movement to reduce this risk.

"Falls in care homes are a question of balance-a balance between control and autonomy, risk-taking and risk-avoidance, maintenance or loss of independence. Care home managers have a legal responsibility to manage the risk of falls within their home, in order to provide a safe environment and an ethos of well-being and quality of life. The health service has a responsibility therefore to provide proactive, multidisciplinary, expert care to the residents of our care homes, to help older people and their family and carers to understand their risk of falling, to intervene to modify risk factors when we can and to manage the risk when we can't."

You can read the full post on the GMJournal website.