Implementing evidence‐based guidelines for falls prevention
The research sought to explain nurses’ implementation of evidence-based guidelines to prevent falls among cognitively-impaired elderly individuals in care institutions. As a result, the observation techniques adopted in an uncontrolled environment were relevant to its aim as they enabled the researchers to obtain information on practitioners’ normal practices. However, the research exhibits weaknesses as it obtains its study sample from two medical facilities. Additionally, staff members were informed of the study, meaning that they were aware of what the researchers were investigating. The authors described all the steps and the protocol followed to complete the study. The researchers highlighted limitations such as the possibility of bias due to the sampling methods and limited period for the study. Additionally, the researchers propose that some care activities, including those performed intimately, like bathing, were not taken into consideration. According to Grealish et al. (2019), although nurses are aware of their responsibilities in limiting falls, implementation is still a challenge due to various limitations and neglect. Therefore, the research findings can be implemented with purpose and the expected outcomes since administrators in institutions can adopt the guidelines to enhance safety in their institutions.
Hospital falls prevention with patient education
The research adopted a literature review methodology, thus allowing it to draw information from numerous resources. The main strength of the study is that it was descriptive and sought information about various variables regarding the involvement of patients in fall prevention and enhancing safety in medical institutions from 43 research articles. The limitation of the study is that it relied on research from secondary sources, meaning that the information was less verifiable compared to using primary methods. In addition, the study did not describe the population demographics of individuals featured in the study and their medical conditions. The authors mentioned limitations such as the non-inclusion of articles not written in English and conflicting information in some articles, as not all of them gave false rates (Heng et al., 2020). Although most individuals perceive ensuring safety and limiting falls as practitioners’ obligations, involving patients can facilitate notable improvements as they will be aware of what to avoid and when to voice out concerns to ensure they do not become victims. Therefore, the administrators in medical institutions can use these findings to improve safety conditions in their institutions.
Preventing falls in hospitalized patients
The research article investigates the types of studies used to examine medical institutions’ fall prevention interventions and examine the effectiveness of the assessment techniques used to analyze adherence to recommended interventions. The study’s strengths are its briefness and conciseness, as it provides critical information without deviating from the topic. Additionally, it highlights major approaches to researching falls, making it more representative. However, the study’s weakness is that it does not discuss how to improve research studies or cite whether the adopted approaches are reliable. In addition, it does not provide solutions for unreliable fall prevention techniques in institutions. Thus, the authors left out the recommendations and did not offer guidance on the way forward. The authors do not mention any limitations in the study. However, they suggest that fall prevention studies are critical to designing effective mitigation strategies since they provide managers with information to facilitate prioritization (LeLaurin & Shorr, 2019). Although the research does not guide practitioners on advanced techniques to limit falls, it can encourage considering various solutions when investigating patient-fall-related issues to enable obtaining more reliable findings.
References
Grealish, L., Real, B., Todd, J. A., Darch, J., Soltau, D., Phelan, M., Lunn, M., Brandis, S., Cooke, M., & Chaboyer, W. (2019). Implementing evidence‐based guidelines for falls prevention: Observations of nursing activities during the care of older people with cognitive impairment. Worldviews on Evidence‐Based Nursing, 16(5), 335-343.
Heng, H., Jazayeri, D., Shaw, L., Kiegaldie, D., Hill, A. M., & Morris, M. E. (2020). Hospital falls prevention with patient education: A scoping review. BMC Geriatrics, 20(1), 1-12.
LeLaurin, J. H., & Shorr, R. I. (2019). Preventing falls in hospitalized patients: State of the science. Clinics in Geriatric Medicine, 35(2), 273-283.