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Falls prevention in rural general practice: what stands the test of time and where to from here?

journal contribution
posted on 2003-10-01, 00:00 authored by Lisa BarnettLisa Barnett, E van Beurden, E Eakin, U Dietrich, J Beard, B Newman
Objective: General practitioner recall of the 1992–96 'Stay on Your Feet' (SOYF) program and its influence on practice were surveyed five years post-intervention to gauge sustainability of the SOYF General Practice (GP) component.

Methods: A survey assessed which SOYF components were still in existence, current practice related to falls prevention, and interest in professional development. All general practitioners (GPs) situated within the boundaries of a rural Area Health Service were mailed a survey in late 2001.

Results: Response rate was 66.5% (139/209). Of 117 GPs in practice at the time of SOYF, 80.2% reported having heard of SOYF and 74.4% of those felt it had influenced practice. Half (50.9%) still had a copy of the SOYF GP resource and of those, 58.6% used it at least 'occasionally'. Three-quarters of GPs surveyed (75.2%) checked medications 'most/almost all' of the time with patients over 60 years; 46.7% assessed falls risk factors; 41.3% gave advice; and 22.6% referred to allied health practitioners. GPs indicated a strong interest in falls prevention-related professional development. There was no significant association between use of the SOYF resource package and any of the current falls prevention practices (all χ2 >0.05).

Conclusions and implications
: There was high recall of SOYF and a general belief that it influenced practice. There was little indication that use of the resource had any lasting influence on GPs' practices. In future, careful thought needs to go into designing a program that has potential to affect long-term change in GPs' falls prevention practice.

History

Journal

Australian and New Zealand journal of public health

Volume

27

Issue

5

Pagination

481 - 485

Publisher

Wiley-Blackwell Publishing Asia

Location

Richmond, Vic.

ISSN

1326-0200

eISSN

1753-6405

Language

eng

Publication classification

C1.1 Refereed article in a scholarly journal

Copyright notice

2003, Wiley-Blackwell Publishing Asia

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