Sunrise Health Region Home Care

Background

• Esterhazy Home Care approached us enthusiastically wanting to be part of this collaborative.

• They recognized that falls were being under reported within their service and wanted to do something about this.

• The population that we are looking after is mostly elderly with many people that have chronic disease issues.

Aim of The Home Care Team

• Our aim was to reduce falls occurring within the home care population.

• To do this we needed to create reporting systems to capture who was falling and why.

• The purpose was to improve the service to the client’s that we serve in the Esterhazy area.

TEAM

• This is a collaborative project being worked on by the Professional Practice department and the Esterhazy Home Care Team.

• Together we are building a falls program to protect our Communities.

Goals

• That every client will have a Tuggs test and environmental assessment completed to provide us with a baseline.

• That all falls will be assessed within 30 days of being reported.

• That the falls interventions will be noted in the clients chart and in the communication book in the home.

Results

Results Continued

Changes Tested

• We have implemented Calendars for our clients to mark in dates when they have not fallen.

• We have created forms that will capture falls as well as look at interventions to limit clients from falling again

• We have implemented Tuggs testing and Environmental scans to provide baseline assessments on all clients.

Lesson’s Learned

• Change occurs slowly. • That the planning of the initiative is crucial to

having a successful roll out. • That knowing why clients fall and where helps

us to look at what we can do about their falls. • Client’s have control of the recommendations

we make to them in this setting. • Communication is key, without it all other

activity grinds to a halt.

Next Steps

• We plan to continue gathering data and making sure that our reporting systems work.

• Working with the physicians and pharmacist within Sunrise and we hope to have a Vitamin D protocol established in the near future.

• Completing intervention assessments after a fall and looking at how to implement suggested interventions.

Community Pillar• Work the Falls Prevention Collaborative to

implementing three community strategies with a focus on community capacity building, prevention of falls and address issue related to mobility.

• Project identified for 2012 – 2014 are walking clubs, Forever In Motion program implementation and inventory of current prevention programs and community audits to identifying barriers like trip hazards.

• All of which are supportive of the principles that we are building in to the Home Care falls program.