The Falls Prevention Service (FPS) is designed to proactively identify patients – who potentially have issues that would otherwise have gone unchecked – to stop them from falling.
Patients must be over 65 years of age to be able to access this service.
The Falls Prevention Team (FPS) offer telephone assessments with a Falls Specialist GP, a Falls Consultant, or a Physiotherapist. The telephone assessment helps us to gage whether the patient is at further risk of falling, or whether there is a need for a physio or geriatrician to see them.
Following this assessment we may then offer a face to face appointment with the relevant member(s) of the team or we will agree a care plan over the telephone and send relevant documents, leaflets and exercises by post.
The FPS Team work alongside the Fire Service and also the Ambulance Service. If a patient has a fall, NEAS (North East Ambulance Service) will automatically offer a referral to us.
We offer a Fire Safety Check to every patient who has an appointment booked in with our service. As well as this we work alongside Age UK who offer Strength and Balance Classes and the majority of our patients will be referred to them for a course of strength and balance training with a specialist physio.
Once all treatment is complete the patient is discharged with a Falls Care Plan and a home exercise booklet. They will also be given other relevant booklets and information when required and in the most appropriate and accessible format and be told to keep a look out for our new exercise booklet ‘HowFit’, arriving in the post, or go to the HowFit website to find out more information.
The information gathered by the team is also sent to the patient’s GP along with any actions or advice that the GP needs to be made aware of. The team aim to complete as many required referrals as possible, but there are some things that we have to ask the patient’s GP to do at their end – such as DEXA scans for bone density and osteoporosis risk assessment – as we cannot receive and action the results of these scans within the service itself.
