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. 2023 Jan-Mar;38(1):55-60.
doi: 10.1097/NCQ.0000000000000653. Epub 2022 Aug 19.

Fall Prevention With the Smart Socks System Reduces Hospital Fall Rates

Tammy Moore  1 , David Kline, Marilly Palettas, Tina Bodine
Affiliations

Fall Prevention With the Smart Socks System Reduces Hospital Fall Rates

Tammy Moore et al. J Nurs Care Qual. 2023 Jan-Mar.

Abstract

Background: Falls of inpatients are common in hospitals. Existing fall prevention measures do not work consistently.

Purpose: To determine whether Smart Socks reduce fall rates in fall risk patients at a major academic health center's neurological and neurosurgical based units.

Methods: A prospective study was conducted that provided fall risk patients with Smart Socks and no other fall prevention system. Data collected included duration of Smart Socks wearing, number of alarms, response times, and patient-days.

Results: A total of 569 fall risk patients were included for 2211.6 patient-days. There were 4999 Smart Socks alarms, but none of the patients fell. We observed a lower fall rate, of 0 per 1000 patient-days, for patients wearing Smart Socks than the historical fall rate of 4 per 1000 patient-days. The median nurse response time was 24 seconds.

Conclusions: The Smart Socks reduced fall rates of fall risk patients included in the study.

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Conflict of interest statement

The authors declare they have no financial or any other relationship with Palarum LLC. The authors declare no other conflicts of interest.

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