1. NSG3NCR Consolidating Reflective Clinical Practice
Answers:
Introduction
Fall injuries are among most serious as well as costly issues within the healthcare setting.
Specifically, among elderly patients, this issue is very common. According to several studies,
increasing age is a significant risk factor for falls (Bergen, Stevens & Burns, 2016). As per
the statistical information from my work setting (Sengkang General Hospital in Singapore),
25% of the population belongs to the older population.
According to a survey which was conducted during the months of November and December
2020, it has been reported that the graph of falling injuries is increasing in our hospital
(Department of statistics, 2020). As a health care professional, I have noticed that there is a
lack of education regarding fall prevention strategies or activities. Due to inappropriate
support and care, older patients often suffer from fall injuries as well as other consequences
of these injuries (Cuevas-Trisan, 2019). However, poor education and lack of awareness are
more common among newly graduated nurses than experienced nurses. For reducing risk
of falls among older patients, educating nurses about some effective strategies is very
important (Stoeckle et al., 2019). In this context, I will provide an evidence-based workshop
for newly graduated nurses to enhance their knowledge regarding fall prevention. The
following discussion will cover current evidence concerning the issue of fall injuries and the
details of the project plan.
Evidence Of Reflection And Analysis
Fall injuries are one of the most important public health concerns throughout the world.
According to the world health organization’s estimation, approximately 684,009 fatal fall
cases occur every year. Hence, globally, this issue is considered the second leading cause of
unintentional injury mortality. Even though they are not fatal, about 37.3 million fall
injuries require proper medical care every year, and 38 million cases are responsible for
disability-adjusted life years or DALYs (Who.int, 2022). There are several risk factors that
are related to fall injuries, including age. In several cases, it has been found that older people
are more prone to falls, and they also have the highest chance of severe injuries or even
death (Harvey et al., 2016). Due to ageing associated with comorbidities, special care is
2. required for the elderly people, and in the case of fall prevention, more attention or support
is needed. There is several research on different topics related to the risk of fall injuries for
older people, among them, according to the study by Johnell et al. (2017), which was
conducted to find out the relationship between antipsychotic medication and fall
incidences, the use of multiple antipsychotic drugs can increase the risk of falls among older
patients. Therefore, a care provider should have an understanding about the medication
that they are providing their patients. On the other hand, older people often have balance
problems (Jin, 2018). In this context, the limited knowledge of healthcare providers
regarding fall prevention activities is one of the significant risk factors for falls (Cuevas-
Trisan, 2019).
Hence, after considering the evidences and research, it can be stated that proper knowledge
and care are crucial to dropping the risk of the chance to fall amongst older people. The aim
of my project plan is to enhance the knowledge of nurses regarding fall prevention through
assessing the gaps.
Project Plan
These educational workshops will consist of some basic training and evidence-based
practices through practical demonstration. All guidelines and information that will be
utilized in the stated educational process will be gathered from the Centre for Disease
Control and Prevention (CDC) (Houry et al., 2016). This program will use a systematic fall
prevention approach. First, they should be introduced or reintroduced to the 4 Ps (Pain,
Placement, Position, and Personal Needs) of fall prevention strategies (Vieira, Palmer, &
Chaves, 2016). Different people have different needs and issues like older patient who have
mobility problem would require assistance for their movement from place to place, some
older patient may require assistance while taking medications as they might not be able to
remember the schedule of the medicines, some patient might require help with their daily
work routine (Bethell et al., 2018). Sometimes, patients need help for selecting the correct
nutrients and their exact amount that needs to be consumed by them so as to ensure intake
of sufficient amount of nutrients (Saghaleini et al., 2018). There are patients suffering from
dementia and so they require maximum help from the care providers even due to minor
work. Some older people might require help for bathing, personal grooming and
dressing. So, the care provider should learn about how to assess these different needs. In
this context, some senior care providers will explain in detail and share their experiences of
taking care of older patient, their needs, their requirements in general, how to care
dementia patients, what strategies must be followed to ensure effective care for the older
people. Often, people are unaware about caring for dementia patient and as a result of this,
they are usually neglected in health care system (Noroozian et al., 2018). These negligence
causes health risk for the older patient suffering from dementia. It is one of the major health
issues worldwide and it has been observed that in most of the cases these older people are
being neglected due to lack of proper training. Similarly, patient with mobility impairment
and other health issues faces challenges in their lives and so proper care is needed for
3. sustaining their lives. Therefore, the senior care providers must share some common
strategies can be implemented in due course for caring for dementia patient. The care
providers must be trained in specific fields that would enable them to provide effective care
to the patient with different needs in their life. Then another significant factor is
communication. Poor communication between a care provider and their patient can
increase the risk of falls. Hence, this training will introduce some strategies regarding
effective communication, such as using verbal and non-verbal communication (Shuman et
al., 2016). Knowledge regarding medication management will also be included in this
workshop. The visual learning process is one of the significant and effective ways of
education (Robinson et al., 2019).
Hence, in this program, handling techniques of the older patients manually for reducing the
risk of fall injuries should be demonstrated practically by the experienced older care
providers. At the end, an evidence-based practice session will be conducted using different
case studies that will help nurses update their concepts regarding fall prevention. A proper
evaluation would occur prior to and after the workshop process, and the evaluation would
be done through a clinical audit. Relevant questions will be used to evaluate nurses’
knowledge and concepts of fall prevention among older people. Including the assessment
of the rate of fall injuries among older people will also help in evaluating the effectiveness of
this program.
Ethical Consideration
Ethical issues are very common in the nursing profession. Considering the nurse’s
autonomy as well as the patient’s benefices and non-maleficence, all these ethics can be
faced by the educator. As a nursing professional, I should consider patients’ benefits at the
top of my priority list. The procedure will adhere to all four major ethical principles, which
are autonomy, nonmaleficence, benefits, and justice (Parker et al., 2020). Besides that, every
participant in this project plan will be treated with respect and anonymity. Participants’
autonomy will be maintained, such as their opinions and issues in implementing fall
prevention strategies, which will also be considered during the educational workshop. In
addition, to avoid any other ethical issues, informed consent will be taken from the
Sengkang General Hospital in Singapore.
Conclusion
In conclusion, fall injuries are one of the most serious and costly issues in the healthcare
setting. According to several studies, increasing age is a significant risk factor for falls. I will
provide an evidence-based workshop for newly graduated nurses to enhance their
knowledge regarding fall prevention. The workshop will cover current evidence regarding
the issue of fall injuries. This training will introduce some strategies regarding effective
communication. Assessing the rate of fall injuries among older people will also help in
evaluating the effectiveness of this program. The visual learning process is one of the most
4. significant and effective ways of education.
References
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