Cent Eur J Nurs Midw 2014, 5(2):47-53

Falls risk factors in an acute-care setting: a retrospective study

Kamila Majkusová^1,*, Darja Jarošová²

¹ Department of Nursing Care, Municipal Hospital Ostrava, Czech Republic

² Department of Nursing and Midwifery, Faculty of Medicine, University of Ostrava, Czech Republic

Aim: The aim of this retrospective study was to analyze the trends of patient falls in Municipal Hospital Ostrava, and to determine the factors which affect the incidence of falls and related injuries.

Methods: All record forms of patients who fell in the years 2004-2009 during hospitalization in MNO have been included in the set. The final file was created from 3 477 records of fall.

Results: The largest incidence of falls was recorded among older seniors aged over 80 years. Statistically significant difference was not found in the incidence of falls between men and women. Most of falls occurred at patients hospitalized in long-term care and internal wards. Patients hospitalized in the acute care wards often fell down when getting up from bed, directly from the bed and due the instability when walking. In long-term care institutions there was the highest incidence of falls when moving from wheelchair to bed, when waking up from not halted mobile wheelchair and for the instability when walking.

Conclusion: The incidence of falls of hospitalized patients is dependent on age, length of hospitalization, patient's health and self-sufficiency, it is not dependent on patients' gender.

Keywords: falls, patient, hospital, retrospective analysis

Received: January 5, 2014; Accepted: February 17, 2014; Published: September 30, 2014  Show citation