New global collaborations and reports on fall prevention guidelines and strategies!
Posted Le 14 juin 2021
I am excited to share news of two global initiatives on fall prevention and management practice guidelines and evidence-based prevention strategies for children, workers and older adults.
1. There's international action on fall prevention and management practice guidelines, headed by Canadian fall prevention expert Dr Montero-Odasso of Western University
New horizons in falls prevention and management for older adults: a global perspective. A worldwide task force developing global clinical practice guideline for the prevention and management of falls in older adults: towards an international consensus.
Montero-Odasso M, van der Velde N, Alexander NB, Becker C, Blain H, et al. Age and Ageing. 2021 Mar 5. DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.1093/
In this article, the global challenges in falls prevention are depicted, the goals of the worldwide task force are summarised and the conceptual framework for development of a global falls prevention and management guideline is presented, along with the timeline to complete the work by fall 2022.
Website: https://worldfallsguidelines.com/
Vimeo Presentation (4:45 minutes) on the Global Falls Guideline initiative https://worldfallsguidelines.com/featured-events
On the Canadian research side, as reported in Loop Discussion 11445 the University of Saskatchewan has published an important scoping study to synthesize international fall risk clinical practice guidelines and recommendations. Find the scoping study at:
Williams-Roberts H, Arnold C, Kemp D, Crizzle A, Johnson S. Scoping Review of Clinical Practice Guidelines for Fall Risk Screening and Assessment in Older Adults across the Care Continuum. Can J Aging. 2020 Sep 28:1-18. DOI: 10.1017/S0714980820000112. Abstract PMID: 32985402.
2. The WHO Step Safely report on strategies for preventing and managing falls across the lifespan
The World Health Organization (WHO) has followed up from its injuries prevention strategies report (see Loop Discussion 11442) with a comprehensive technical package of a report, infographic and evidence synthesis report on falls. The package provides concrete recommendations for evidence-based strategies to prevent and manage falls for children and adolescents, workers, and older people.
See https://www.who.int/teams/social-determinants-of-health/safety-and-mobility/step-safely
I did a quick scan of the report’s contents, introduction and the Annex on levels of evidence. It's clearly written to appeal to decision/policy-makers and backed up by strong evidence. There is the WHO Falls Fact sheet and a very good Infographic.
Later I'll dive in more into the Evidence Synthesis report/technical package from the George Institute for Global Health and UNSW School of Population Health.