Balance and Falls

According to the CDC, more than one third of adults 65 and older fall each year in the United States and 20% to 30% of people who fall suffer moderate to severe injuries. Physical therapists can help in risk reduction and prevention of falls.

Patient Care

• Benign Paroxysmal Positional Vertigo (BPPV)
• Falls and Prevention Article Collection (PTJ)
• SSRIs Linked With Increased Falls Risk in Nursing Home Residents - 1/23/12
• Pocket Guide: Physical Fitness and Falls Risk Reduction (.pdf)
• Podcast: Falls Prevention Awareness
• State Policy Toolkit for Advancing Fall Prevention (.pdf)

Consumer Education

• Physical Therapist's Guide to Falls (moveforwardpt.com)

Consumer Events

• News Now: Preparing for Falls Prevention Day (August 2012)
• Developing Consumer Events on Balance, Falls, and Exercise

Consumer Handouts

• Physical Therapy and Falls Prevention (.pdf)
• Physical Therapy and the Balance System (.pdf)

Multimedia Resources

• PowerPoint Presentation: Falls Risk Reduction and Prevention (.ppt)
• Video: For Caregivers: Home Safety Tips
• Video: Improving Balance and Avoiding Falls (MoveForwardPT.com)

CEU Courses

• Balance and Falls: Benign Paroxysmal Positional Vertigo (BPPV)
• Balance and Falls: Intervention Strategies
• Balance and Falls: The Physiology of Aging
• Geriatrics: Fear of Falling in Older Adults: Evidence-based Strategies for Examination and Intervention Management
• Falls in Community Dwelling Older Adults - Part I: Introduction to the Problem
• Falls in Community Dwelling Older Adults - Part II: Examination and Evaluation
• Falls in Community Dwelling Older Adults - Part III: Reducing Falls in Inpatient Settings

Related Resources

• CDC: STEADI Toolkit

  CDC's Injury Center created the STEADI Tool Kit for health care providers who see older adults in their practice who are at risk of falling or who may have fallen in the past. The STEADI Tool Kit provides information and tools needed to assess and address older patients' fall risk.

• CDC: Preventing Falls Among Older Adults

  This site includes information for clinicians, consumers, and educators and a number of links to additional programs and resources. Resources and tools such as fact sheets, data and statistics information, and downloadable brochures and posters are available. All of the materials are available online for download at no cost. We encourage you to share this information and promote it throughout your organization.

• Falls Prevention Community

  APTA members can access this online Sharepoint community and post ideas, questions, etc. about falls prevention.

• Transforming Fall Management Practices

  This conference will provide participants with research, best practices, and lessons learned in preventing and managing mobility-related adverse events with a primary focus on falls and a secondary focus on wandering/elopement.

• Stopfalls.org

  This site identifies best practices in falls prevention and helps communities offer falls prevention programs to older people who are at risk of falling as a service of the Fall Prevention Center of Excellence created by the California Fall Prevention Consortium (CFPC). This Web site includes information for clinicians, consumers, and educators and a number of links to additional resources.

• Partnership for Healthy Aging: Multidisciplinary Competencies

  The Partnership for Health in Aging (PHA) developed of a set of core competencies in the care of older adults that are relevant to and can be endorsed by all health professional disciplines.

• Falls Free Coalition

  The Falls Free Coalition is a group of national organizations, including the APTA, and state coalitions working to reduce the growing number of falls and fall-related injuries among older adults. This site provides a link to the National Action Plan in addition to numerous resources and tools for falls prevention including brochures, presentations, legislative updates, etc.

National Council on Aging (NCOA) Resources

• Community Programs: Overview
• Matter of Balance
• Otago

  Otago is an individually tailored program of muscle-strengthening and balance-retraining exercises of increasing difficulty, combined with a walking program. This extensively tested fall prevention program is now used worldwide. The program is delivered by either a PT experienced in prescribing exercises for older adults.

• Stepping On
• Tai Chi: Moving for Better Balance

• Last Updated: 12/12/2012
• Contact: practice-dept@apta.org
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