​Falls prevention collaborative

Under the 'focus on preventing harm' pillar of the Trust's Quality Strategy, the Trust aims to reduce the incidence, occurrence and level of harm relating to falls by 2022.

In 2018, the Trust took part in an NHS Improvement Falls Collaborative, which involved us trialling new falls prevention methods on two of our later life and memory services (LLAMS) wards to test their effectiveness in reducing the number of falls. This 90-day trial took place between June and September. 

Following this trial, we have since extended our internal falls group to include representatives from all our older people's wards to share the learning and generate new ideas, and the Falls Prevention Collaborative will be working to increase awareness of falls prevention among clinical staff across the Trust.

We will be continuing to use the scientific improvement methodology to trial and implement further ideas. 

  • Simple Steps to Stop Falls campaign launch on our Later Life and Memory Service (LLAMS) wards (see below for more information)
  • Focused falls prevention training packaged developed and delivered, aimed at all LLAMS ward staff 
  • Falls clinics established on all LLAMS wards with standardised processes

We are using NHS Improvement methodology to continually measure the impact our activity.

On our later life and memory service (LLAMS) wards, everyone – from physiotherapists and occupational therapists to nurses, domestic staff, carers and relatives – has an important role to play in falls prevention. 

That's why Golborne, Parsonage, Kingsley and Rydal wards are introducing three simple steps we can all take to stop falls:

Graphic depicting steps you can take to stop falls

By taking these simple steps on our ward every day, we believe this will play an important role in reducing the number of falls across our later life and memory wards.

We have also developed a 'Simple Steps to Stop Falls' training package aimed at LLAMS ward staff to and will be rolling this out over the coming weeks.

There is lots of work going on both within our later life and memory wards and across our Trust to reduce falls, but these three simple steps will form a key part of our overall efforts to reduce inpatient falls, as well as harm resulting from falls.

Let's work together to prevent falls on our wards.