Safety of hospitalized older adult patients: an analysis of the risk of falls

Abstract

Objective To identify the risk of falls of older adults in a hospital in the Trairi region in Rio Grande do Norte, Brazil, and to describe the relationship between risk of falls and the sociodemographic characteristics of the participants. Method A descriptive, transversal, and quantitative study conducted in a regional hospital, respecting the ethical principles in force. The Morse Scale was adopted for data collection, which took place in July and August 2018, and adapted with sociodemographic questions. A descriptive and inferential statistical analysis was performed. Results There were 46 participants in the study, most of whom were women with low education, and the most frequent reasons for hospitalization were surgical treatment and lung disease. More than half had a high risk of falling (54.35%), followed by moderate (32.61%) and low (13.04%). There was an association between high risk of falls, having lung disease as a reason for hospitalization and diabetes as a comorbidity. The high risk of falls was less frequent among older adult patients hospitalized for surgical treatment. Conclusion The high risk of falls was found in more than half of the older adults, which varied according to the reason for hospitalization and comorbidities, being more frequent in those hospitalized for lung disease and in those who had Diabetes.