Factors associated with the risk of fall in adults in the postoperative period: a cross-sectional study.
Luciana Regina Ferreira da Mata, Cissa Azevedo, Aryanne Gabrielle Policarpo and 1 others
PMID 28614431WHAT IT FOUND
Postoperative patients with hypertension, diabetes, or cancer had much higher fall risk.
Older age and lower surgical recovery scores also predicted high risk. Pain presence was not associated with fall risk.
Key findings
01Hypertension, diabetes, and cancer were associated with high fall risk, while pain was not.
02Increasing age and lower surgical recovery scores were associated with high fall risk.
STILL TO COME
How it was doneWhat they foundWhat it means for RNs
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What it does not show
Pain was assessed without a validated scale, which may have obscured its relationship with fall risk. Environmental and human resource factors were not evaluated. The Brazilian version of the Morse Fall Scale has not been validated for accuracy.
The easy way to misread this
Do not assume that pain presence identifies high fall risk in postoperative patients. This study found no association between pain and fall risk, likely because pain was not measured with a validated scale.