Title : Assessment of risk of falls and fracture in older women: Project in primary care in women’s health
Abstract:
The United Nations Decade of Healthy Ageing (2021–2030) is a global collaboration, aligned with the last ten years of the Sustainable Development Goals, to improve the lives of older people, their families, and the communities in which they live. Among the impacts and health problems of the elderly, falls represent a major public health problem due to their high incidence and the severity of their physical, functional, psychological and financial consequences. More than 30% of individuals aged 65 or over suffer a fall every year and in around 50% of these cases falls are recurrent. There are many measures being used to predict the risk of falls in research and clinical practice, and it is important to investigate the usefulness and consistency of these measures, even if it is to reduce the number of possible risk of falls indicators.
In this line, our study analyzed variables associated with the risk of falls, mainly aspects of physical performance. Thus, the aim of project is develop the protocol to assess the risk of falls and fractures in frail older women. The protocol consists of evaluating the association of sleep disorders, history of falls, physical performance and body composition with bone mineral density to verify the conditions in which women can fall, especially at home, and promote early diagnosis as the main health care. We are working with several validated tools used to assess falls and sleep disorders and after statistical analysis and a pilot program, we developed a new model with short questions and tests to be applied more easily in the Health Units of our province.
Pilot program showed that the Berg balance scale was not accurate in total points and the most effective tests to detect the risk of falls were reaching forward and standing on one leg. The short physical performance battery had great results for specific analyzes as a whole. The Pittsburgh questionnaire was excluded and we only used questions about sleep time and daytime sleepiness. Regarding anamnesis, the most important issues predicting falls that should be included in any assessment were: falls for at least 12 months, living alone and medications.
For the Congress, I will explain the importance of evaluating the loss of bone and muscle mass from menopause to aging, the specific tools and objectives of each phase and the main results already found.
Audience Take Away:
- Understand the evolution of changes and losses in body composition from menopause to aging.
- This is the new protocol that can improve the vision of health professionals who work in primary health care for fragile women.
- The protocol is for scientific development, but mainly for clinical application.
- The presentation of our results can help other researchers in comparing similar research and in the development of multicenter projects.
