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Falls in Dementia Sample Paper

Falls in Dementia Sample Paper

Introduction.

Dementia can be described as a group of thinking and social symptoms that greatly interfere with the daily functioning of an individual. Patients will normally present with forgetfulness. This condition also greatly impacts both their social well-being and thought forming capabilities (Ng et al., 2019). The condition greatly impacts individuals aged sixty-five years and above mostly. Medication and therapy play a critical part in the management of this condition.

Rationale for the Specific Health Risk.

The occurrence of falls in patients with Alzheimer’s and other types of dementia is common. People with these conditions are three times more likely to experience hip fractures from a fall when compared to other people (Mosk et al., 2017). The result of these fractures is immobility and resultant surgeries. The mortality rate in people with Alzheimer’s and other types of dementia secondary to a fall is estimated to be greater than in other individuals (Jeon et al., 2019). This information clearly proves the severity of this condition and indicates the need to strongly implement interventions aimed at reducing and preventing falls in patients with dementia.

The exact number of people with dementia in Australia is currently unknown. An estimate, however, placed the number of people with dementia at a figure between four hundred thousand and four hundred and sixty thousand in 2020 (Livingston et al., 2020). This figure is expected to increase to approximately five hundred and ninety thousand people by the year 2030. These figures demonstrate the great urgency to deal with the problem of dementia.

The increased rate of fall in patients with dementia further solidifies the need to address the issue. Falls in people with dementia greatly increase the morbidity and mortality rates consequently increasing medical costs. Therefore, there is need to address this issue.

Selection of the audience

There are several risk factors associated with falls in dementia patients. Some of the commonest risk factors include physical weakness and lack of balance, impaired memory, poor judgement, pain and discomfort, a need to use the bathroom among others (Harrison et al., 2020). The reason why I selected nurses as my target audience is because they spend more time with the patients and are better placed in the formulation of interventions geared towards the prevention of falls in patients with dementia.

Nurses spend a majority of time with patients. This means that they are capable of picking up on any pain or discomfort that the patient may be feeling. As noted earlier, pain and discomfort which consequently forces patients to move is one of the commonest causes of falls (Kim et al., 2017). The nurse therefore, has ample time and ability to note any pain being experienced by patients and ensure that the situation is dealt with to prevent further crisis later on.

Nursing staff are required to assess and assist people aged 65 and over with their daily activities. This is dependent on the patient’s ability to function normally (Mailhot-Bisson, 2018). While caring for elderly, nurses are regularly involved in activities such as cleaning them and aiding them to access facilities such as the bathroom. As the target audience of the poster, nurses can fully grasp the magnitude of the ability they have in the prevention of falls in patients by constantly being available to offer help.

Nursing staff play a critical role in ensuring that patients live in organized, tidy and well-li rooms. Some of the major causes of falls include poor lighting within patients’ rooms and disorganization and clutter within those rooms. The poster describes the importance of the nurse ensuring that the room is tidy and neat and how such simple acts can go a long way in reducing the rate and incidence of falls in patients with dementia.

Relevance of selected poster features.

            I have ensured that the title of this poster “Falls in Dementia” is kept short, simple but still effective in the conveyance of the message intended without bringing any confusion. The use of clear and well labelled icons is critical in ensuring that the reader clearly understands the main message that I am trying to put across (Davis et al., 2018). The use of bright colours is critical in ensuring that I fully capture the attention of the target audience.

Contrasting colours further help to relay the message that different data is being shared on the poster. This poster had an appropriate ratio of coloured content to white-space as highlighted in the guidelines. This 30% white space in a scholarly poster ensures visual breathing room for the eyes.

The picture used in the poster, termed as “People 2-community Nurse With Patient Cartoon” is important for several reasons. The picture plays a key role in breaking the monotonous state of the poster. It also clearly demonstrates the importance of a good nurse patient relationship which is critical ins ensuring positive outcomes and vital in minimizing patient falls in this scenario.

The icons placed on both the left and right side of the title contain vital information including statistics of the issue being addressed. This is critical in capturing the target audience’s attention and highlighting the magnitude of the issue being addressed (Erkin et al., 2018). Further grouping of information into smaller subgroups including the risk factors, need to know information and necessary interventions is important.

It ensures that there is no confusion and that the target audience clearly knows that they have moved from one item to another. the bullets at the far-right side of the poster emphasize critical information regarding the situation at hand further highlighting the importance of addressing falls in dementia patients.

Implications of Nursing Care Related to Environmental Changes.

Environmental health determinants are critical in the assessment, diagnosis, intervention, planning and evaluation components of nursing practice (McKibben, 2017). Environmental changes such as reduced government funding can greatly impact the overall health of the elderly. In this scenario, lack of adequate funds to purchase equipment such as bed alarms in hospitals greatly undermines the effort to curb the occurrence of falling among patients with dementia.

Reduced human resource in nursing homes and hospitals also greatly impacts health care quality and provision. The reduction in nurses can result from government policies or staffing problems (Benton et al., 2020). The overall problem that results from this is the reduced care offered to the elderly. Reduced care and attention greatly increase the risk of falling especially in the elderly with dementia, greatly hindering progress towards reducing occurrence of these falls.

            Nursing staff have a key role to play to try and deal with the issue of falls. They must first identify and document areas that require changes and push for the changes where possible to ensure that fall rates reduce. Implementation of other key guidelines laid out in order to curb the prevalence of falls among dementia patients should also be done by the nursing staff.

Conclusion.

In conclusion, dementia is a condition that greatly affects a vast number of the population negatively impacting their daily lives. The condition greatly predisposes to falls which consequently increase morbidity and mortality rates. This is mostly prevalent among the elderly, especially those aged sixty-five years and above. A poster aimed at nurses is one way of trying to reduce the occurrence of falls in elderly patients with dementia. The poster clearly outlines the statistics, clearly showing the magnitude of the issue, risk factors and necessary intervention methods that nurses can employ to reduce and fully curb the issue of falls.

References.

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