Resident safety
are a number of practical tips that need to be followed but equally important are the changes needed in the community as a whole.
Practical tips to avoid falls To get the best results we would recommend the following 14 practical measures. 1. Care homes consider allocating the role of ‘Falls Champion’ to one member of staff, supporting them to learn about falls prevention and to implement falls prevention practices in the home. Our research indicates this is a key role that cannot be bought in and is better if it is part of the care home staff structure.
2. Falls are talked about in an open an honest way with residents, families, staff and care home owners. Falls are everyone’s concern from the cleaner to the manager to the owner.
Our research found that the homes where falls were recorded and discussed are more ready to take part in research to address the problems and those that had the biggest positive change in falls reduction.
3. Care home staff reject the assumption that people who have dementia are evidently going to fall. Our research found this belief to be detrimental to reducing fall rates and we found no evidence that the ACTiON Falls programme was less effective in people with dementia as with those without.
4. Acknowledge that some falls are going to occur, as we try and keep people active
Fall rates in care homes who had used this programme (compared) with those that had not (was) reduced by 43 per cent and each fall averted cost £191
and with liberty. Research has found that where falls were discussed with families as people moved into homes, then risks could be better managed.
5. For people who have frequent falls, keep a log of when and where they fell, patterns often appear over a period of time and things such as adjusting medication or meal times might reduce the falls rate.
6. All care home staff recognise that falls prevention is a whole system approach which includes: risk factor reduction
across the whole life of a person; case finding and risk assessment and making recommended changes happen. For example, an extra handrail on the
walls might help more than one resident; better lighting in the bathrooms might be an action the caretaker leads on.
7. To implement the ACTiON Falls programme, at least 70 per cent of care home staff need to learn how to use it. Our research suggest this takes one hour and is best completed in small group training sessions.
8. The training is provided by an expert in falls and the ACTiON Falls programme.
9. Care home staff watch our free-of- charge films together to help reinforce the ACTiON Falls concept. By taking a systematic approach to a number of falls risks, then the combination will show results. Films and case studies can be found at
https://www.reactto.co.uk/ resources/react-to-falls/.
10. The ACTiON Falls programme is used with every resident, the assessment and checklist are kept in the care plan and the actions are completed as soon as possible and recorded in the care plan. Our research shows that, for the
programme to be sustained, documents need to be embedded in the care home records and accessible.
11. A systematic approach is used to keep the actions as high priority. For example, talking about how to help a resident to
April 2022
www.thecarehomeenvironment.com 37
©Katarzyna Bialasiewicz
Photographee.eu
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