Nursing fall assessment tool

Development of a scale to identify the fall-prone patient. Can J Aging ; Reprinted with the permission of Cambridge University Press. In addition to completion of the module, training should include real cases where the provider conducts an assessment. Mental status and gait parameters require actual assessment of a real patient as opposed to solely a chart review.

This tool can be used by staff nurses. Use this tool in conjunction with clinical assessment and a review of medications go to Tool 3I to determine if a patient is at risk for falls and plan care accordingly. Note that this scale may not capture the risk factors that are most important on your hospital ward, so consider your local circumstances.

If your hospital uses an electronic health record, consult your hospital's information systems staff about integrating this tool into the electronic health record. A prospective study to identify the fall-prone patient. Soc Sci Med ; 28 1 However, note that Morse herself said that the appropriate cut-points to distinguish risk should be determined by each institution based on the risk profile of its patients.

Can J Aging ;8; Return to Roadmap. Content last reviewed March Browse Topics. Twenty-six assessment tools for fall risk were used in the selected articles, and they tended to vary based on the setting. The fall risk assessment tools currently used for the elderly did not show sufficiently high predictive validity for differentiating high and low fall risks. We concluded that rather than a single measure, two assessment tools used together would better evaluate the characteristics of falls by the elderly that can occur due to a multitude of factors and maximize the advantages of each for predicting the occurrence of falls.

Keywords: Accidental falls; Meta-analysis; Older adults; Sensitivity and specificity. Abstract The prevention of falls among the elderly is arguably one of the most important public health issues in today's aging society.