A fall affects not only the resident who experiences it, but your staff who helps them recover from it, their family members who hear about it, and your quality metrics that suffer from it. Addressing the indirect impact that falls have on the human side of care could lead to a new way of looking at the need for innovative fall prevention.
Staff Burnout
High turnover is a direct result of high stress work environments for care staff. In an already-packed day, one fall will add a large amount of paperwork, extensive post-fall monitoring, and potential loss of resident mobility, which will require more staff assistance. In some situations, care staff may be unable to give the residents the one-on-one emotional support they need after the trauma of a fall, which can also add to work stress. Staff turnover negatively impacts quality scores, but addressing one large, preventable factor of the equation—resident falls—could change turnover rates for the better.
Family Trust
When your quality scores are low, marketing to new residents and their families becomes difficult. Being able to reassure new residents that there are top-tier preventative measures in place to keep them safe from falls—and having the numbers to prove it—will not only bring up occupancy, but also give family members peace of mind about entrusting their loved ones to you. 25-55% of community-living older adults admit a fear of falling. Keeping your fall numbers low will keep resident trust high.
Innovative Prevention
More and more long-term care facilities are turning to fall prevention technology to minimize the probability of falls. Bed pads and virtual sitters became popular fast when they were the only available options. However, those solutions have left healthcare providers wanting, and many are now searching for more effective solutions, like AI monitoring. VirtuSense’s AI fall prevention technology has produced results of up to 96% reduction in falls with injury in post-acute care.
Indirect fall costs can add up—but they don’t have to. Read more about the most significant indirect costs of falls in our white paper, The True Cost of Falls, covering litigation, quality scores, and cost of staff. You’ll also learn how other communities are drastically reducing falls with strategic prevention.
