Objectives:

To know the incidence of falls in institutionalized old people assessing the characteristics of the elderly and the fall, consequences and recurrence.

Methodology:

observational, descriptive, prospective study. The target population is 393 old people of a residence for elderly people in Teruel, we included over 65 years. The collected data were analyzed with the statistical program SPSS 20.

Results:

during the follow-up, there were 146 falls suffered by 80 old people; more than half had suffered a fall before follow-up and more than a third suffered more than one fall during the follow-up months. 87% of the injured were over 80 years old. Predominated falls in the female sex, in the bedroom and in the afternoon. More than 70% of the cases had no consequences. More than 80% were polymedicated.

Conclusions:

knowing the characteristics of institutionalized old people who fall is essential to be able to apply preventive measures against this geriatric syndrome due to its high prevalence in this population.

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