Falling (accident)

Elderly

In elderly, even falls from standing position to flat ground may cause serious injuries. Stephen Lord at the University of New South Wales studied 80,000 elderly persons in Australia and found that the risk of falling increases for any who are taking multiple prescription medications and for all who are taking psychoactive drugs. This increased risk was demonstrated through the use of a variety of balance and reaction time tests. Older men when matched with women of identical height, weight, and age, on average, performed measurably better in all of the balance and reaction time tests.

Workplace

In the occupational setting, falling incidents are commonly referred to as slips, trips, and falls (STFs). Falls from elevation hazards are present at almost every jobsite, and many workers are exposed to these hazards daily. As such, falls are an important topic for occupational safety and health services. Any walking/working surface could be a potential fall hazard. An unprotected side or edge which is 6 feet (1.8 m) or more above a lower level should be protected from falling by the use of a guard rail system, safety net system, or personal fall arrest system. These hazardous exposures exist in many forms, and can be as seemingly innocuous as changing a light bulb from a step ladder to something as high-risk as installing bolts on high steel at 200 feet (61 m) in the air. In 2000, 717 workers died of injuries caused by falls from ladders, scaffolds, buildings, or other elevations. More recent data in 2011, found that STFs contributed to 14% of all workplace fatalities in the United States that year.

Companies must make sure that they follow the applicable safety legislation (e.g., the Occupational Safety and Health Act in the United States) to keep their work environments safe.

Risk factors

The National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health has compiled certain known risk factors that have been found responsible for STFs in the workplace setting. While falling can occur at any time and by any means in the workplace, these factors have been known to cause same-level falls, which are less likely to occur than falls to a lower level.

Workplace factors: spills on walking surfaces, ice, precipitation (snow/sleet/rain), loose mats or rugs, boxes/containers, poor lighting, uneven walking surfaces

Work organization factors: fast work pace, work tasks involving liquids or greases

Individual factors: age; employee fatigue; failing eyesight / use of bifocals; inappropriate, loose, or poor-fitting footwear

Preventive measures: warning signs

Intentionally caused falls

Injurious falls can be caused intentionally, as in cases of defenestration or deliberate jumping.

Height and severity

The severity of injury increases with the height of the fall but also depends on body and surface features and the manner of the body's impacts against the surface. The chance of surviving increases if landing on a highly deformable surface (a surface that is easily bent, compressed, or displaced) such as snow or water.

Injuries caused by falls from buildings vary depending on the building's height and the age of the person. Falls from a building's second floor/story (American English) or first floor/storey (British English and equivalent idioms in continental European languages) usually cause injuries but are not fatal. Overall, the height at which 50% of children die from a fall is between four and five storey heights (around 12 to 15 metres or 40 to 50 feet) above the ground.

Prevention

Rates of falls in hospital can be reduced with a number of interventions together by 0.72 from baseline in the elderly. In nursing homes fall prevention problems that involve a number of interventions prevent recurrent falls.

Epidemiology

In 2013 unintentional falls resulted in 556,000 deaths up from 341,000 deaths in 1990. They are the second most common cause of death from unintentional injuries after motor vehicle collisions. They were the most common cause of injury seen in emergency departments in the United States. One study found that there were nearly 7.9 million emergency department visits involving falls, nearly 35.7% of all encounters.