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Centre for Policy on Ageing | |
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Falls and psychotropic drug consumption in long-term care residents
— is there an obvious association? | | Author(s) | Harald A Nygaard |
| Journal title | Gerontology, vol 44, no 1, January-February 1998 |
| Pages | pp 46-50 |
| Keywords | Falls ; Drugs ; Residents [care homes] ; Long term ; Care homes ; Longitudinal surveys ; Norway. |
| Annotation | People qualifying for long-term care must exhibit a high degree of dependency, caused by physical and/or mental impairment; falls may be a factor. This study investigated fallers in three local long-term care facilities in Bergen, Norway. 118 residents were observed for 6-months with respect to fall episodes. Prior to the study, gender, age, mental capacity, mobility, the ability to go to the toilet, to eat, and to communicate, and all drugs prescribed on a regular schedule were recorded. Subsequently the various elements were compared for fallers and non-fallers. There were 49 fallers. There was no difference between the two groups regarding gender, age or drug use. Mental impairment and restricted mobility were independently associated with risk of falling. Falling was also associated with the degree of mental impairment. A stratified Mantel-Haenzel test showed a significant higher tendency to fall among residents using antipsychotics. Those with restricted mobility using anxiolytics/hypnotics or antidepressants had a lower tendency to fall than non-users, and were less prone to fall repeatedly. Anxiety and depressive states may possibly contribute to falling. (RH). |
| Accession Number | CPA-980827223 A |
| Classmark | OLF: LLD: KX: 4Q: KW: 3J: 76N |
Data © Centre for Policy on Ageing |
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| ...from the Ageinfo database published by Centre for Policy on Ageing. |
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