148 Inpatient Medications and Occurrence of FALL in Hospital Sungai Buloh, Malaysia

Abstract

Abstract Introduction It is important to identify whether the fallers were taking the drug that is associated with fall since drug is potentially a modifiable factor. This study is conducted to determine whether inpatient medications are associated with fall. Methodology This is a cross sectional study involving fallers in our hospital in 2018 (excluding Pediatric fallers). Data were collected from Falls Incident Reporting Form (HSB-MED-FORM-018 Pin. 1/18), and analyzed via SPSS version 23. Results In 2018, a total of 113 patients experienced inpatient fall. Medical department topped as the highest number of falls in the hospital [70 (61.9%)]. 82 (72.6%) were male and only 36 (32.7%) of the fallers were more than 65 years old. Of those fallers, 63 (55.8%) were taking at least one high risk medication. Nearly half (42.9%) of them took 2 or more high risk agents. Only 12 (10.6%) fallers were on polypharmacy (use of >5 medications). However, there is no significant association between high risk medication and polypharmacy (p=0.580). The most commonly prescribed class of drug associated with fall is antihypertensive, diuretics and anticonvulsant. The use of anticonvulsant in patient aged more than 65 is associated with fall (p=0.041). Of the 113 falls analyzed, 54 (52.2%) resulted in no injury and the rest resulted in an injury involving swelling, skin tear, laceration and other injury. Conclusion We found out from this cohort that the use of antihypertensive is likely to induce inpatient fall incidents. We also discovered that elderly is at a higher risk of falling when prescribed with CNS drugs. Intervention to prevent falls should focus on withdrawing the high risk drug and reducing the total number of drugs. We would like to propose that the form to be improvised in order to get more findings on drugs causing fall.