Statistics of Falls in Elderly People

This presentation provides an overview of the statistics of falls in elderly people. It includes the number of incidents, mortality rate, morbidity rate, hospitalization rate, types of injuries, hospital costs, impact on patients' health and hospital resources, burden to family members, and re-admission rates. The data is sourced from Aihw.gov.au and Health.nsw.gov.au.

Statistics of Falls

Number of falls incidents in aged 65 and over
• The estimated number of the fall incidents in the people aged 5 years and
older in the year 2012-2013 was 98,704.
• The rates of the fall increased over the 11 years to June 2013 accounting
for about 35 per year.

Male and female rate
• 31,735 in the males to that of 66,969 for that of the females.
• This showed that females than suffered almost twice the number of falls
that of the males

Rates
• Mortality rate due to falls-aged 65 and above (compare with previous data)-
changes
For the people above 65 years old, the rate of mortality was found to be 696 a rate
of 52.7/100,000 population.
• Morbidity rate due to falls-aged 65 and over (compare with previous data)-
changes
For the people above 65 years old, the rate of morbidity was found to be 40,889 a
rate of 3,126/100,000 population (compared with 38,487 a rate of
2,993/100,000 population in 2015/16)
• Disability rate due to falls-aged 65 and over (compare with previous data)-
changes
50.7 % of the older adults had faced disability due to fall in the year 2015

Number of people hospitalised due to falls
aged 65 and ove
• 111222 people aged over the 65 years of age had been hospitalised due to
fall in the year 2014 to 2015

Falls related injuries -aged 65 and over
• About 92,150 fall injuries are involving people 65 years and older and have
been hospitalised in the year 2010 to 2011

Types of injuries (for example hip-fracture, head injury)-changes
• The main increase in the age-standardized rate of Head injury occurring
due to fall over the 13 years to June 2013 was estimated to be 6.8% per
year for women and the rate of the men is seen to be increased by 6.8%.

Types of injuries (for example hip-fracture,
head injury)-changes
• Open wound was found to be present for about 6258 men and 7689
women who had suffered falls in the year 2014-2015.
• Fracture as present in 16550 males and 44079 females.
• Dislocation injury is present in 625 males and 1111 females who have
suffered a fall in the year 2014-2015.

Falls in the hospital
• In the year 2015-2016, about 34000 falls had resulted from the patient
harm in the hospitals. It took place at a rate of 3.2 falls per 1000
separations

Hospitalised cost, average cost
• The total cost of the healthcare associated with that of the fall injuries in
the older people in NSW was about $558.5 million in the year 2006-
2007.studies have shown that hospital admitted cases accounted for
about 84.5 per cent of the total costs

Impact on patients’ health and hospital
resources
• These are seen to include pain, bruising, haematomas, scratches and
other superficial wounds, lacerations, intracranial bleeding and
lacerations.
• The number of patient days also becomes quite higher along with increase
total cost of hospitalisation along with expenditure of resources

The burden to family members
• Financial pressures in the family
• Emotional stress
• Loss of quality of lives
• Depression and others

Re-admission rates
• About 33904 fall related cases came back for follow-up care separations
for the people who are aged 65 years and older and were identified in the
year 2009 and 2010. There was a 14% increase in this aspect for the
previous years.

references
• References:
• Aihw.gov.au, 2009, Hospitalizations due to falls by older people, Australia
2009–10 , Australian Institute of Health and Welfare [online] retrieved from:
https://www.aihw.gov.au/reports/injury/hospitalisations-falls-older-people-
2009-10/contents/table-of-contents; Accessed on: 11th October
• Aihw.gov.au, 2014, Trends in hospitalized injury due to falls in older people
2002–03 to 2014–15, Australian Institute of Health and Welfare [online]
retrieved from: https://www.aihw.gov.au/getmedia/39e62afd-7207-460d-
aaa6-4f0c95ae665a/aihw-injcat-191.pdf.aspx?inline=true Accessed on: 11th
October
• Health.nsw.gov.au, 2006, The Incidence and Cost of Falls Injury Among Older
People in New South Wales, NSW Department Of Health 2006/07 retrieved
from: https://www.health.nsw.gov.au/falls/Publications/incidence-cost-of-
falls.pdf Accessed on: 11th October