Visual Impairment in Patients Presenting with a Fall and a Non-Hip Fragility Fracture

Abstract

In the UK, there are approximately 536,000 new fragility fractures each year, comprising 79,000 hip fractures, 66,000 clinically diagnosed vertebral fractures, 69,000 forearm fractures and 322,000 other fractures [1]. Visual impairment is one of the major risk factors contributing to the risk of falling. Both central and peripheral visual impairment have been shown to be significantly associated with falls and hip fractures [2,3]. Approximately 2/3rd of hip fracture patients have some form of visual impairment, of which over half of these are correctable due to cataracts and/or uncorrected refractive errors [4- 5]. The prevalence of visual impairment in those presenting with a non-hip fragility fracture following a falls is unknown.