NURS FPX 8006 Assessment 1 Forming an Innovative Healthcare Team to Promote a New Approach to a Current and Ongoing Healthcare Issue

NURS FPX 8006 Assessment 1

Forming an Innovative Healthcare Team to Promote a New Approach to a Current and Ongoing Healthcare Issue 

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Capella University

NURS-FPX8006

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Submission date 

Forming an Innovative Healthcare Team to Promote a New Approach to a Current and Ongoing Healthcare Issue

Falls in elderly patients with long term care is a significant problem of the elderly patients in terms of public health and patient safety. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (2024) state that 1 out of every four adults aged more than 65 years falls annually, and falls are the leading cause of injury-related mortality among this population.

The risk is increased in long-term care facilities due to frailty, polypharmacy, cognitive impairment, and mobility problems. Falls prevention needs an interprofessional, multifaceted approach that engages the experience of various healthcare professionals. This paper proposes a strategy to assemble an interprofessional team to work on fall prevention among elderly patients in long-term care based on the opinion of four healthcare professionals and evidence-based studies.

Healthcare Issue

Fall prevention among older adults residing in long-term care is the selected healthcare problem. The population is very susceptible due to physiological decline with age, the presence of multiple comorbidities, and dependence on institutional care. Although the prevalence of falls increases in the elderly population that lives in the community (i.e., about 30-40 percent) compared to the nursing home population (i.e., nearly 50 percent), the burden remains higher in institutionalized populations (Bastami & Azadi, 2020A study conducted by Lee and Yu (2020) demonstrated that multifactorial programs (i.e., exercise, reviewing medication, and environmental adjustments) will reduce fall rates by up to 30 percent.

Based on the findings of the latest Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (2024) report, falls are the leading cause of fatal and nonfatal injuries affecting older adults in the United States, and over 3 million emergency department visits annually are caused by falls. Besides, O’Connor et al. (2022) stated that approximately 37.3 million falls requiring medical attention occur every year worldwide, and the majority of them concern older adults. The fact that risk factors such as polypharmacy, cognitive impairment, muscle weakness, and environmental hazards interact to contribute to the greater risks of falls is evidence that the condition is intertwined.

The physical effects of falls are as follows: falls have not only physical effects but also psychological effects, such as fear of falling, loss of independence, and a decline in life quality. Baumann et al. (2022) determined that interprofessional fall-prevention teams in residential care were linked to a 19 percent reduction in the rate of hospital admissions caused by fall-related injuries. In the same line of thought, the study conducted by Wiedenmann et al. (2023) demonstrated that exercise interventions focused on balance and functional training reduced the risk of a fall by 23 percent in older people. Moreover, Baumann et al. (2022) stressed that interdisciplinary fall-prevention programs that involve nursing, physical therapy, pharmacists, and geriatricians are better than single-discipline programs, and that is why team-based strategies are needed. An interprofessional team is necessary to solve the problem since it cannot be solved in a single area.

Roles and Perspectives

As a member of the interprofessional team tackling fall prevention among older people in long-term care facilities, the registered nurse, physical therapist, pharmacist, and geriatrician bring a mix of skills to the table to improve outcomes. The registered nurse coordinates daily provision, risk assessment using validated tools, individual fall-prevention strategies, and educates residents and their families to foster safety (Ojo & Thiamwong, 2022). Physical therapists offer assessments of gait and balance, prescription of exercise and assistive devices to recover mobility and independence (Wiedenmann et al., 2023).

Pharmacists identify and manage the risks of polypharmacy, monitor the risks of adverse drug reactions such as sedation or dizziness, and deprescribe unsafe medications to minimize the chances of falls (Baumann et al., 2022). The geriatrician also addresses the medical complexities of the aging residents to make sure that comorbidities such as osteoporosis, cardiovascular disease, and dementia are well addressed and integrates the team recommendations into the individual plans of care.

The behavioral health interdisciplinary program (BHIP) model illustrates the fact that interdisciplinary team-based models in healthcare result in reduced fragmentation and improved clinical outcomes and patient safety. Pharmacists in interprofessional primary healthcare teams enable comprehensive medication management and patient counseling and collaborate with other medical professionals to make decisions to avoid preventable adverse drug events (Wiedenmann et al., 2023).

The interprofessional collaboration is effective in decreasing falls and hospitalizations and improving the quality of life of the older adults who are in institution-based care (O’Connor et al., 2022). Collectively, the disciplines create a holistic patient-centered initiative that adds to the multifactorial etiology of falls. Interprofessional collaboration is not only a reinforcement of preventive care but also a long-term resident safety and well-being.

Critical Appraisal of Studies

The research conducted with the help of quantitative methods offers quantitative data about the fall prevention procedures in long-term care. Albasha et al. (2023) examined the opinions of employees on the ways of addressing the problem of falls in long-term care homes. The problem with the research was that evidence-based practice (exercise, medication review, and vitamin D supplementation) was not applied in the current staff approaches to a great extent. This study aimed to investigate staff knowledge and practices, as well as propose solutions to prevent falls. The literature review identified the gaps in the recommended guidelines and staff practices. The design of the study was a cross-sectional survey. The sampling was done with 155 respondents among the staff of 13 LTC facilities in southwest Ireland.

The environment was various LTC sites of different sizes. The ethical considerations were informed consent and institutional approval. The methods of data collection included paper and online surveys, and data analysis was based on content analysis with the help of the Theoretical Domains Framework. The result was that staff members often proposed environmental changes, employee education, and alarms, but few proposed proactive risk assessment, exercise, or medication review.

The discussion revealed a knowledge gap among employees regarding evidence-based practices in fall prevention. The limitations were a poor response rate (15%) and the possibility of sampling bias. Conclusions revealed a necessity for further training of the staff and the incorporation of guideline-based practices. Information on funding was not clearly stated.

The research conducted with the help of quantitative methods offers quantitative data about the fall prevention procedures in long-term care. Albasha et al. (2023) examined the opinions of employees on the ways of addressing the problem of falls in long-term care homes. The research problem was that evidence-based practice (exercise, medication review, and vitamin D supplementation) was not applied to a great extent in the current staff approaches. This study aimed to investigate staff knowledge and practices, as well as propose solutions to prevent falls. The literature review identified the gaps in the recommended guidelines and staff practices. The design of the study was a cross-sectional survey. The sampling was done with 155 respondents among the staff of 13 LTC facilities in southwest Ireland.

The environment was various LTC sites of different sizes. The ethical considerations were informed consent and institutional approval. The methods of data collection included paper and online surveys, and data analysis was based on content analysis with the help of the Theoretical Domains Framework. The result was that staff members often proposed environmental changes, employee education, and alarms, but few proposed proactive risk assessment, exercise, or medication review.

The discussion revealed a knowledge gap among employees regarding evidence-based practices in fall prevention. The limitations were a poor response rate (15%) and the possibility of sampling bias. Conclusions revealed a necessity for further training of the staff and the incorporation of guideline-based practices. Information on funding was not clearly stated.

Outcomes and Solutions

Among the leading suggestions that the interprofessional team can make is a multifactorial fall-prevention program that can be applied to older residents of long-term care facilities. The model combines nursing risk assessment, exercise interventions led by physiotherapists, medication reviews with the help of pharmacists, and geriatricians supervising (Ojo & Thiamwong, 2022). It was proven that falls do not have a single cause but are the result of he interaction of physical deterioration, polypharmacy, environmental risk factors, and chronic diseases (Lee & Yu, 2020). Therefore, such an interdisciplinary approach that addresses the related risks is more effective compared to discipline-specific interventions.

The registered nurse would plan the screening of fall risks with the assistance of certified techniques such as the Morse Fall Scale, and introduce education programs among residents and their families to raise awareness and encourage adherence to preventative measures. Personalized exercises, including those on balance and strength, would be offered by the physical therapist, and this intervention can prevent falls up to 23 percent (Papalia et al., 2020).

Finally, the geriatrician would include all the recommendations in the care plan of the resident to ensure that comorbidities such as osteoporosis and dementia are under control. The team will be interdisciplinary, combining professional opinions to facilitate a comprehensive and evidence-based program. Research conducted by Ojo and Thiamwong (2022) and Baumann et al. (2022) has confirmed that interprofessional multifactorial programs decrease falls and consequent hospitalizations to a significant level. Consequently, the team intervention will improve the health of the elderly long-term care residents.

Conclusion

Multidisciplinary care teams play a crucial role in addressing complex healthcare issues, such as fall prevention among older people in long-term care facilities. The teams bring together the expertise of nurses, physical therapists, pharmacists, and geriatricians, and, by doing so, the risk factors are dealt with in a comprehensive and whole-person approach. The plan lies in the multifactorial nature of falls because it emphasizes physiological deterioration, medication risk factors, environmental factors, and chronic conditions.

The strategies involve systematic assessment of fall-risk, physical activity, and balance training, medication, and individualization of medical care. The intervention, when combined, leads to the fact that older people experience improvements in safety outcomes, mobility, independence, and overall quality of life. 

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