App to prevent care home falls could save the NHS ‘millions’
AN APP that caused falls to decline by a third in more than 100 care homes in partnership with the NHS could be rolled out across Britain, potentially saving “millions” in injuries from falls.
Currently, falls cost the healthcare system more than £2.3billion per year, according to the National Institute for Health and Care Excellence (Nice).
Safe Steps, a preventive digital risk assessment app, has seen a reduction in falls by 28 per cent in just nine months in more than 100 care homes, compared with the previous year.
Carers use the app to assess the patients by 12 measures, such as vision, environment and medication, allowing them to determine the level of risk each patient has of falling and tailor their treatment accordingly.
The app will then warn carers periodically to check on those at risk of falls depending on their answers. The frequency of check-ups is determined by the answers to the risk assessment.
The app costs £100 per care home and is being licensed to Clinical Commissioning Groups.
Lee Omar, co-founder of Safe Steps, told The Sunday Telegraph that the app was expected to provide a return on investment of 500 per cent per area.
The number of elderly people dying as a result of a fall has risen in recent years, according to figures released by the Office for National Statistics (ONS).
In 2010, 3,003 people over the age of 65 died as a result of falls. That went up to 4,856 by 2015 and by 2017, it was 5,048, according to the ONS.
GPs already using Safe Steps have said it could save the NHS “millions”.
Dr Saif Ahmed, GP and clinical director for Tameside and Glossop Integrated Care NHS Foundation Trust, said: “We are investing in Safe Steps as a new, innovative way of alleviating workload, but at the same time improving patient care. Falls are often used as a proxy measure of frailty. Frailty is one of the things that cost the NHS the most at the moment and so with Safe Steps reducing the amount of falls it will actually be saving the NHS millions.”
The app has so far been used to complete 5,000 risk assessments in Greater Manchester, Cheshire and Merseyside, and it is expected to reach 10,000 assessments by the end of 2019.