Indoor Falls Shorten Lifespan

Injuries due to falls can result in long-term functional impairment.  Sebastien Bailly, from Hospices Civils de Lyon (France), and colleagues observe that indoor falls may be a sign of otherwise undetected frailty, which may shorten lifespan.  The team studied 329 women, average age 84 years, who were surveyed every 4 years to ascertain the occurrence of falls. The vital status was checked up to 13 years after these four years. An accelerated failure-time model was used to estimate the effect of the falling profiles on women survival. Focusing on those 329 women who had fallen the week before the phone call follow-ups, the researchers found that 26% were environmental falls, 19% were outside falls, 43% were inside falls and 12% were falls from height.  At 13 years, the team followed up, to find that 269 women had died.  Data revealed that those who had fallen indoors had an average survival time of 7.6 years, compared with 9.2 years for women who had any other type of fall.    Separate from the type of falls women had, the researchers also found that women with advanced age, signs of frailty, slow walking speeds, and had other health conditions – also experienced shorter survival times.  Writing that: “Elderly women with inside falls had shorter survivals than others,” the study authors urge that: “Indoor falls could be markers of an underlying frailty and should trigger adequate prevention and protection measures.”