New Clinical Rehabilitation Approach for the Management of Falls Risks

Accidental falls in older adults are one of the world's major pubic health problem, because of their strong association with injuries and mortality rates. In Quebec, falls are responsible for a high rate of hospitalization (more than 1800 emergency department visits every day) and deaths (more than 10,000 in recent years). Preventing falls is therefore a key mission for health professionals. This research program aims to develop a new clinical approach to the rehabilitation management of the older with a neuro-musculoskeletal disorder and a risk of falling. This program is part of a new partnership project between UQAC and specialized geriatric services at the CIUSSS Saguenay-Lac-St-Jean (La Baie site). These geriatric services admit more than 400 new patients per year, representing a large pool of participants for the new program's development. Specifically, this program has 4 phases: 1) Create a clinical profile of patients in rehabilitation care from specialized geriatric services (ex: reasons for consultation, neuro-musculoskeletal disorders, rates and causes of falls, etc.); 2) to diagnose functional deficits of these patients on different dimensions of functional and physical evaluations, using standardized tests and high-tech instruments (ex: platform of force); 3) determine the effectiveness of a new exercise intervention program (OTAGO) for falls prevention; and 4) Measure client and professional team satisfaction as well as long-term impact of this new approach used to prevent falls. The most significant impact of this new program will be to reduce public health expenditure for care of older adults with balance disorder and risk for falls; and therefore, be implanted in other CIUSSS institutions from Quebec.