Risk Factor of falling among the elderly?a prospective study

[[abstract]]Old people over 67 in Taiwan were traced for a period of three years in this research for an understanding of the rate of falling down and risk factors of falling and recurrent fall for the elderly people in Taiwan. The source of data was based on the third major interview survey for the investigation on health care and career planning of the middle to old age people in Taiwan (1996) and the fourth major interview survey for the long-term tracing investigation of physical, mental, social and living conditions of the mid and elderly in Taiwan (1999). The subject of study was 2,157 senile citizens of 67 years old in 1996 who were over 70 in 1999.Logistic regression analysis was used to test the effect of each independent variable. Important findings of this research are as follows: The rate of falling down in the past year for the old people in Taiwan was 19.5% ,and the recurrent fall in the all faller was 39.9%. Risk factors of falling down consist of gender (female), obstacles of ADL, hindrances of IADL, a melancholy inclination and use of canes. Risk factors of recurrent fall consist of obstacles of ADL, fear fall and wouldn?t went outside. According to the study results, it will suggested that follow-up tracing based on falling experiences in 1999 can be applied to researches in the future so that the domestic studies on causal relationship can be more complete. For policies, it will suggested elder could do exercise and public health service, family and social worker could help depressed elder to eliminate falling down. Public health service could provide how to improve elder home to better to prevent falling