Falls remain one of the most persistent safety challenges in healthcare today. For patients and their families, the consequences can be deeply distressing, leading to physical injury, emotional trauma, and a loss of confidence that can significantly impact quality of life. In mental health facilities, falls not only heighten anxiety among patients but also affect the wellbeing of those who care for them. While human safety is paramount, the financial strain, through treatment, longer stays, and increased care needs, also places added pressure on already stretched services.
What’s most concerning is that many falls are preventable. And yet, they remain among the most frequently reported incidents across healthcare settings. It’s clear that while awareness is high, traditional methods haven’t been enough to truly turn the tide. To protect patients and support staff more effectively, particularly when it comes to fall prevention in older adults, healthcare providers must embrace smarter, more proactive strategies.
Traditional Prevention Tactics: Are They Enough?
Common fall prevention interventions such as hourly rounding, sensor mats, and risk assessments, have long been part of the standard toolkit. While these tactics are important, they often rely on periodic checks or static risk scores, which can miss subtle changes in a patient’s condition or behaviour.
Sensor mats, for instance, only alert staff after a patient has stepped out of bed. Hourly checks, though well-intentioned, offer only momentary reassurance as anything can happen in the time between rounds. Staff often end up relying on gut instinct or past experience, rather than being supported by live, reliable data.
These limitations create a reactive culture, responding to incidents after they happen rather than preventing falls in the first place.
Digital monitoring technologies are now offering a game-changing layer in patient fall prevention. With the ability to monitor patients continuously and unobtrusively, platforms like Oxehealth’s are helping staff to spot early warning signs of potential falls before they happen.
The Oxehealth platform monitors patient activity in real-time and proactively notifies staff when key indicators of potential fall risk are detected, enabling timely intervention and support. These behaviours include getting out of bed without assistance, spending an unusually long time in the bathroom, or being out of bed for extended periods during the night. This is particularly valuable in dementia care and other older adult mental health settings, where fall risk intervention may be needed.
Alerts are sent directly to tablets or nursing station monitors, giving staff the insights they need to act quickly. Because monitoring is contact-free and non-disruptive, it enhances fall safety for elderly patients without disturbing patients’ rest or increasing staff workload.
By shifting from reactive responses to proactive monitoring, the platform represents a significant advancement in fall prevention for hospitals, offering a reliable tool to help care teams reduce fall risk by allowing them to anticipate and prevent falls before they happen.
Real-World Results: Evidence That It Works
Oxehealth’s platform isn’t just a promising innovation, it’s a proven solution in effective fall injury prevention delivering measurable results. In the Manor dementia inpatient wards at Coventry and Warwickshire Partnership NHS Trust, the introduction of the platform led to:
But beyond statistics, staff report feeling more confident and better supported in prioritising care. By providing real-time, contactless insights into patient activity, the Oxehealth platform allows them to intervene earlier and more effectively, resulting in greater fall protection for elderly patients and calmer, safer environments.
Care teams value how the platform enhances, rather than replaces, their clinical judgement - key to any patient-centred fall prevention approach. Patients benefit too, experiencing fewer interruptions and a greater sense of safety, especially overnight.
“The severity of falls and associated injuries have reduced massively at night. I think it’s because we can intervene earlier. For example, we can attend to patients within seconds if they are disoriented or confused so they do not slip and fall.” - Unit Manager
In short, Oxehealth’s technology isn’t just enhancing fall prevention strategies, it’s helping to reshape the entire care experience.
Reframing the Narrative: From Reactive to Preventative Care
Oxehealth’s technology is reshaping falls prevention programs, transitioning the approach from reactive to preventative. By equipping staff with real-time alerts and activity data, it supports timely interventions and empowers teams to build a culture of fall safety and foresight. This is especially crucial for preventing falls in elderly patients in long-term care facilities, dementia care, and older adult mental health settings.
Importantly, the platform doesn’t replace therapeutic care but instead strengthens it. By reducing the guesswork, it frees up staff to focus their attention where it’s most needed, improving both efficiency and outcomes.
Conclusion: The Future of Falls Prevention
Reducing falls is about more than hitting safety targets and meeting compliance goals. It’s about protecting dignity, building trust, and delivering better care. With tools like the Oxehealth platform, healthcare providers can shift from reactive management to fall risk reduction and proactive prevention.
Falls among older adults may always pose some risk, but with the right technology in place, they don’t have to be inevitable. Now is the time for healthcare leaders to reimagine their approach and embrace innovations that keep patients safer, for longer.
Built into the Oxehealth platform: Real-time fall risk monitoring is fully integrated within the Oxehealth platform, working alongside our other patient monitoring and safety features to enhance situational awareness and support more informed care decisions.
