@article{ref1,
title="Increased fall rates in nursing home residents after relocation to a new facility",
journal="Journal of the American Geriatrics Society",
year="1995",
author="Friedman, S. M. and Williamson, J. D. and Lee, B. H. and Ankrom, M. A. and Ryan, S. D. and Denman, S. J.",
volume="43",
number="11",
pages="1237-1242",
abstract="OBJECTIVE: To examine the change in fall rates after relocation of nursing home residents from one facility to another and to identify resident risk factors for changes in falls following relocation. DESIGN: Retrospective review of incident reports to identify falls, followed by chart review of a longitudinal cohort. SETTING: An academic nursing home whose residents and programs moved from a 125-year-old, 233-bed facility to a newly constructed 255-bed facility. PATIENTS: A total of 210 nursing home residents were moved from one facility to the other. Of these, 133 individuals who lived in the old facility for 9 months before the move and in the new facility for 6 months after the move formed the longitudinal cohort. RESULTS: In the 3 months after the move, the fall rate increased from 0.34 to 0.70 falls per resident per quarter in the entire nursing home population (P < .001) and subsequently returned to baseline. In the longitudinal subgroup the fall rate went from 0.26 to 0.60 (P < .005). Fall-related injuries in the longitudinal subgroup went from 0.058 injuries per resident per quarter at baseline to 0.15 (P < .001). However, the injury rate per fall did not change. There were no characteristics associated with being a faller in the quarter before the move. Dementia and not being bedbound were associated with being a faller after the move. Individuals who were ambulatory or wheelchair mobile had a significant risk of increasing the number of falls after the move, and individuals with dementia had a strong but insignificant trend in this direction. CONCLUSIONS: The incidence of falling doubled after relocation of nursing home residents to a new facility. An increase in falls was seen in individuals who were not bedbound. Although nursing home relocation may be a relatively uncommon occurrence, it is reasonable to infer that older individuals who change their living environments are at increased risk for falls and fall-related injuries.<p /><p>Language: en</p>",
language="en",
issn="0002-8614",
doi="",
url="http://dx.doi.org/"
}