• Korean Journal of Health Education and Promotion
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• v.24 no.4
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• pp.23-39
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• 2007

Objective: The objective of this study is to identify the risk factors for falls among the Korean elderly population. Methods: We analyzed the data on 167 persons of 65 years of age or older who have experienced falls drawn from the Third Korea National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey. We conducted a cross-tabulation analysis and logistic regression analysis of the impact of the socio-demographic characteristics, health-related behavior, mobility, and morbidity upon the frequencies of falls. Results: Among the socio-demographic characteristics, gender(p<0.001), marital status(p<0.1), and the type of medical insurance(<0.1) were found to be statistically significant, Among the constraints on mobility, the severity of walking problems, (p<0.001) and depression(p<0.05) proved to be significant, As for variables related to health-related behavior, the level of routine physical activities (p<0.001) was found significant, Finally, rheumatism(p<0.1), osteoporosis(p<0.05), diabetes(p<0.1), urinary incontinence(p<0.01) were also significant. A logistic regression analysis of the incidence of falls revealed that urinary incontinence was the most important risk factor with an odds ratio of 2.7. Conclusion: Although a variety of factors affect the frequencies of falls in the elderly population, urinary incontinence proved to be the single most important risk factor. This finding implies that education for fall prevention is crucial for those with urinary incontinence.

• Journal of Korean Academy of Nursing
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• v.47 no.3
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• pp.420-430
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• 2017

Purpose: The aim of this study was to explore characteristics of and risk factors for accidental inpatient falls. Methods: Participants were classified as fallers or non-fallers based on the fall history of inpatients in a tertiary hospital in Seoul between June 2014 and May 2015. Data on falls were obtained from the fall report forms and data on risk factors were obtained from the electronic nursing records. Characteristics of fallers and non-fallers were analyzed using descriptive statistics. Risk factors for falls were identified using univariate analyses and logistic regression analysis. Results: Average length of stay prior to the fall was 21.52 days and average age of fallers was 61.37 years. Most falls occurred during the night shifts and in the bedroom and were due to sudden leg weakness during ambulation. It was found that gender, BMI, physical problems such elimination, gait, vision and hearing and medications such as sleeping pills, antiarrhythmics, vasodilators, and muscle relaxant were statistically significant factors affecting falls. Conclusion: The findings show that there are significant risk factors such as BMI and history of surgery which are not part of fall assessment tools. There are also items on fall assessment tools which are not found to be significant such as mental status, emotional unstability, dizziness, and impairment of urination. Therefore, these various risk factors should be examined in the fall risk assessments and these risk factors should be considered in the development of fall assessment tools.

• Journal of vocational education research
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• v.30 no.4
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• pp.89-111
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• 2011

The purpose of this study was to examine the elderly care facilities worker's attitude and awareness of associated factors of falls. The subject was 194 the elderly care facilities workers in Chungbuk. Descriptive statistics, t-test, ANOVA, Pearson correlation coefficient was utilized for the data analysis. The results of this study were as follows. the score of attitude was $2.98{\pm}.34$ out of 4, the score of awareness of associated factors was $3.00{\pm}.43$ out of 4. There were statistically significant differences of attitude and awareness of associated factors of falls according to general characteristics. the relationship of attitude and awareness of associated factors of falls was significantly positive. Falls is important health related problem in elderly care facilities, so effective fall prevention program is needed for elderly care facilities worker.

• Physical Therapy Korea
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• v.28 no.3
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• pp.161-167
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• 2021

Understanding sciences behind fall-related hip fractures in older adults is important to develop effective interventions for prevention. The aim of this review is to provide biomechanical understanding and prevention strategies of falls and related hip fractures in older adults, in order to guide future research directions from biomechanical perspectives. While most hip fractures are due to a fall, a few of falls are injurious causing hip fractures, and most falls are non-injurious. Fall mechanics are important in determining injurious versus non-injurious falls. Many different biomechanical factors contribute to the risk of hip fracture, and effects of each individual factors are known well. However, combining effects, and correlation and causation among the factors are poorly understood. While fall prevention interventions include exercise, vision correction, vitamin D intake and environment modification, injury prevention strategies include use of hip protectors, compliant flooring and safe landing strategies, vitamin D intake and exercise. While fall risk assessments have well been established, limited efforts have been made for injury risk assessments. Better understanding is necessary on the correlation and causation among factors affecting the risk of falls and related hip fractures in older adults. Development of the hip fracture risk assessment technique is required to establish more efficient intervention models for fall-related hip fractures in older adults.

• Journal of The Korean Society of Integrative Medicine
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• v.9 no.3
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• pp.99-110
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• 2021

Purpose: The purpose of this study was to understand the experience and meaning of falls among care workers caring for the elderly. Methods: The participants comprised 10 care workers in Seoul and Gyeonggi Province, South Korea. The data collection period was from September to November 2020, and the data were obtained through individual in-depth interviews. The collected data were analyzed using the content analysis method of qualitative research. The main interview questions were as follows: First, in the event of a fall, "can you tell us about your experience and how you dealt with the fall?; second, "can you tell us about your role and the role of family members or the center that manages falls that occur outside of nursing visits.", third, "can you tell us about the difficulties in managing falls based on your experience?", and fourth, "how are falls that occur during nursing visits managed?" Results: As a result of analyzing the experiences of nursing care workers of falls while caring for elders in their homes, five main themes were derived. These were understanding the characteristics of the elderly at home, understanding possible emergency situations, providing caring services, minimizing physical harm, and delivering clear information. Conclusion: A significant finding of this study was that care workers who visit and provide care to elders at home confirmed the need for standard guidelines on appropriate responses in the event of a fall at home and the importance of managing emergencies arising from falls among elders at home. These results highlight the need for the development of emergency response education programs, such as programs on fall care among nurses and care workers who provide care to the elderly, and for enhanced understanding of the fall risk of elders who live at home.

• Journal of The Korea Institute of Healthcare Architecture
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• v.27 no.4
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• pp.61-70
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• 2021

Purpose: The study aims at identifying patient-related and environmental factors associated with an increased risk of falling and, therefore, both caregivers and designers can be aware of fall risk factors and can contribute to prevent inpatient falls in their own areas of expertise. Methods: A case-control study has been conducted, utilizing patient data and physical environmental data in the unit of General Medicine in the United States. The case-control study investigated data about patients who had suffered falls as well as patients with similar characteristics (e.g., age, gender, and diagnosis) who did not suffer falls. Results: The study identified both patient-related and physical environmental factors associated with inpatient falls. Morse fall risk score, patient visibility, and patient accessibilityB were identified as significant predictors to inpatient falls, when controlling for other significant variables. Implications: The findings of the study can provide implications to both caregivers and healthcare and hospital environment designers. Caregivers should give special attention to patients with high Morse Fall Risk Scores to prevent inpatient falls. Designers also need to examine and to fine-tune the unit layout of inpatient care units to maximize each patient room's patient visibility from the rest of the unit and patient accessibilityB from working areas of nurses.

• Journal of Korean Clinical Nursing Research
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• v.29 no.1
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• pp.56-66
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• 2023

Purpose: This study aimed to investigate whether the comprehensive nursing care service positively affected accidental falls and pressure injuries. Methods: This study was a retrospective study that analyzed the accidental falls and pressure injuries cases in an acute care hospital located in Seoul and compared the rates of accidental falls and pressure injuries before and after the comprehensive nursing care service was operated. Results: Comparing the accidental fall incidence rates per 100 person-months between a comprehensive nursing care ward and a general ward, it showed fewer accidental falls by 0.44 in comprehensive nursing care wards, but the result was not statistically significant. In the case of pressure ulcers, the incident rate per 100 person-month was 6.17 in general wards and 4.77 in comprehensive nursing care wards, which showed that the number of pressure ulcer patients was lower in comprehensive nursing care wards, however it was also not statistically significant. Conclusion: It is not confirmed that the operation of the comprehensive nursing care service contributes to the reduction of accidental hospital falls or pressure injuries. Follow-up studies are recommended to determine the effectiveness of comprehensive nursing services in quality indicators.

• Research in Community and Public Health Nursing
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• v.12 no.3
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• pp.600-608
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• 2001

Accidents are the fourth-leading causal factor of death among the elderly, and fall is a major type of accident (53.17%). Many cases of falls in the elderly result in delayed discovery and loss of quality of life. As the number of the elderly grows, falls will be a more important health problem. Most previous research on falls investigated prevalence. mortality, and the related factors. There are many studies proving the effect of rhythmic movements. But few researches considered linking risk factors of fall with rhythmic movements. Purpose: We want to show the changes after performing rhythmic movement program, in risk factors of falls and mobility such as flexibility, balance, muscle power and persistency in the elderly, in order to provide basic information needed for the development of fall injury prevention program for the elderly. Method: The design of this study is quasi-experimental, the equivalent control group, pretest-posttest. The subjects consist of 124 people who lived in Do-Bong-Qu. Seoul, agreed to participate in this study, and were able to follow this rhythmic movement program. About 93 % of them are from 65 to 84 years (Mean${\pm}$sd: $73.7{\pm}5.7$): 64% are female. The rhythmic movement program was designed. and performed by two community health nurses working in the Do-Bong-Gu Public Health Center, regularly twice a week from May, 4 to December, 17. in 10 senior citizens' community centers. Risk factors of fall were measured with RAFS- II (Risk Assessment for Falls Scale II) by asking about each item: mobility was measured by observing their specific movements asked by investigators. Results: 1. After performing the program during 7 months, risk factors score of falls were decreased significantly (paired-t = 4.77. p<0.01). 2. After performing the program during 7 months, flexibility (paired-t = 2.26. p=0.03) and mobility were improved (paired-t = 4.98. p<0.01). but muscle power and persistency did not change (paired-t = 0.33. p=0.74). Overall, mobility affecting the occurrence of falls was improved significantly (paired-t = 5.15. p<0.01). Conclusions: A regular rhythmic movement program can be helpful in preventing falls in the elderly. Further. we can develop a fall injury prevention program using rhythmic movement.

• 한국노년학
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• v.39 no.2
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• pp.231-240
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• 2019

The study aimed to identify risk factors for falls as well as hospitalization status according to disease and demographic characteristics of demented inpatients by investigating the in-depth Injury Patient Surveillance System data collected by Korea Centers for Disease Control and Prevention(KCDC). Older adults over 60 years old who were diagnosed with dementia were included(n=1,732). Their data were analyzed after being assigned to either a fall group or a non-fall group. STATA was used for statistical analyses, such as frequency analysis, chi-square (χ²) test, and logistics regression. It was found that 8.0% of the demented inpatients experienced falls. According to the analysis on category of fall and non-fall group were statistically significant difference in age and Charlson Comorbidity Index(CCI) and bone density deficiency. Based on the logistic regression analysis of factors affecting falls, older adults over 80 are 2.386 times more likely to fall and based on a target with a CCI of 0, the risk of falls is 0.421 times lower, finally based on those without bone density disorder, the fall risk for those with bone density disorder was 3.581 times higher. Therefore, we expect that the important about the factors relating to falls identified in this can not only be found valuable for educating inpatients with dementia and care-givers, but also be used as reference that supports clinical professionals to make decisions on falls management for patients with dementia.

• Physical Therapy Rehabilitation Science
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• v.7 no.3
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• pp.139-145
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• 2018

Objective: Older persons with diabetes mellitus (DM) are particularly more likely to have fallen in the previous year than those without DM. The purpose of this study was to investigate the relationship between the risk of falls and type 2 DM in older adults who are 65 years of age or above. Design: A systematic review. Methods: PubMed and other two databases were searched up to August 2, 2018. Observational and cohort studies evaluating fall risk in people who are 65 years of age or above with DM were included. This review extracted the following information from each study selected: first author's surname, year of publication, country, average follow-up period, sex, age at enrollment, study population, measurement variables, relative risk, 95% confidence intervals and controlled variables. Results: This review involved nine cohort studies with 3,765 older adults with DM and 12,989 older adults without DM. Six studies compared with or without DM and two studies compared fallers with non-fallers with DM. Risk factors for falls included impaired cognitive function, diabetes-related complications (peripheral nerve dysfunction, visual impairment), and physical function (balance, gait velocity, muscle strength, and severity of physical activities). Conclusions: People who are 65 years of age or above with DM have increased risk of falling caused by impaired cognitive function, peripheral nerve dysfunction, visual impairment, and physical function in community-dwellers. For adults who are 65 years of age or older with DM, research fields and clinical settings should consider therapeutic approaches to improve these risk factors for falls.