Session Information
Date: Saturday, November 16, 2019
Session Title: Annual Assembly Late Breaking Posters (Non Presentations)
Session Time: 11:15am-12:45pm
Location: Research Hub - Kiosk 8
Disclosures: Valentina Graci, PhD: No financial relationships or conflicts of interest
Objective: Pediatric hospital falls show rates that range from 0.56 to 2.19 per 1000 patient days. Falls at the Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia (CHOP) are associated with standing and unsteady gait, but specific characteristics of fall dynamics are unknown. The aim of this investigation was to identify the effect of age, gender, and hospital environment on the pediatric fall dynamics at CHOP.
Design: We analyzed 756 falls from the CHOP Keep All Patients Safe (KAPS) database.
Setting: n/a
Participants: Patients’ age group (i.e. toddlers <3 months, children 4-7 y.o., pre-teens 8-12 y.o., and teens 13-17 y.o.), gender, environment (i.e. patient room, bathroom, playroom, hallway, any other room type), and fall dynamics (i.e. fall occurring while: walking/running, sitting, laying, standing, or jumping/climbing) were abstracted.
Interventions: n/a
Main Outcome Measures: Chi-square tests were used to understand the effect of patients’ age, gender, and environment on fall dynamics. Logistic regression identified associations between fall dynamics and specific age groups, gender, and hospital environments.
Results: The majority of falls happened while patients were walking or running (36% of falls, P=.02) compared to all other fall dynamics (sitting 30%, standing 19%, laying 10%, jumping/climbing 5%). Toddler and Patient Room were respectively the two variables showing the greatest number of falls, and therefore they were used as references for comparisons with all the other variables. The likelihood of falling during walking or running for Preteens and Teens was 2.13 times greater than in any other dynamics (P <.02).
Conclusions: These results suggest that a biomechanical investigation of pediatric falls in hospital settings is warranted to further identify the most common fall patterns and develop strategies to prevent them. Additionally, including pediatric biomechanical characteristics (e.g. patient’s movement ability) in the currently used pediatric fall risk assessment tools may improve our predictive capabilities.
Level of Evidence: Level I
To cite this abstract in AMA style:
Jaffe A, Nkrumah A, Alexandroni K, Prosser L, Graci V. The Biomechanics of Pediatric Falls: A Novel Approach to Fall Risk Assessment in the Hospital [abstract]. PM R. 2019; 11(S2)(suppl 2). https://pmrjabstracts.org/abstract/the-biomechanics-of-pediatric-falls-a-novel-approach-to-fall-risk-assessment-in-the-hospital/. Accessed May 12, 2025.« Back to AAPM&R Annual Assembly 2019
PM&R Meeting Abstracts - https://pmrjabstracts.org/abstract/the-biomechanics-of-pediatric-falls-a-novel-approach-to-fall-risk-assessment-in-the-hospital/