Brain Injury Australia Campaigns to Prevent Brain Injury from Falls

Saturday, 11 February 2012 14:18

DID YOU KNOW?

• Falls are the leading cause of traumatic brain injury in Australia, accounting for 42% of hospitalisations in 2004-2005.

• Falls are also the leading cause of injury hospitalisations overall, accounting for 1 in every 3 - or nearly 126,800 – injury admissions in 2003-2004.

• Of all causes of traumatic brain injury, falls are the most fatal - 63% resulted in death in 2004-2005.

• 3,300 Australians aged 65 years and over were hospitalised in 2004-2005 with a traumatic brain injury from of a fall.

• Traumatic brain injuries the result of a fall in Australians aged 65 and over made up 1 in every 7 traumatic brain injury hospitalizations in 2004-2005, across all age groups and causes.

• Australians aged 65 years and over accounted for 62% of all traumatic brain injury deaths in hospital in 2004-2005 - 1 in every 6 the result of a fall.

• “Head injury” was the second most common falls-related injury (after those to the hip and thigh) in Australians aged 65 and over during 2005-2006, occurring in 17% of cases.

• Around 70,000 Australians aged 65 and over were admitted to hospital in 2005-2006 for a falls injury - an increase of 10% over 2003-2004 admission numbers.  While falls injuries to the hip and thigh in this age group have fallen, rates of head injury have risen – to almost 1 in every 5 admissions.

• 3,846 falls from ladders resulted in serious injury in 2004–2005. The number of ladder-related injuries involving people aged 60 years and over is increasing at a much higher rate than for any other age group - by 24.2% between 1999 and 2005, more than triple the rate of increase of those aged less than 60.

• Fall-related injuries are very costly. The Australian Institute of Health and Welfare estimated the healthcare cost during 2003-2004 of falls in people aged 65 and over at $566 million.  A study commissioned by the Department of Health and Ageing predicts that by 2051 the total health costs attributable to fall-related injury in the elderly will increase “almost threefold” to $1.375 billion per annum – requiring an additional 886,000 hospital bed days and 3,320 extra residential aged care places.

BRAIN INJURY AUSTRALIA'S 2008-2009 POLICY PAPER

Falls are now the leading cause of traumatic brain injury (TBI) throughout the developed world, due to ageing populations. Even though fall-related injuries to the head are consistently the second most common after hip fracture, head trauma in older people is often discounted in health and aged care and appropriate neurological assessment and monitoring overlooked.  And though rates of falls-related injuries to the head are rising while those for hip fracture are falling, brain injury fails to feature in Australia’s falls prevention programs.

For more information about falls-related traumatic brain injury (TBI), read Brain Injury Australia's 2008-2009 policy paper prepared for the Australian Government's Department of Families, Housing, Community Services and Indigenous Affairs. Download the policy paper  [Adobe Acrobat PDF - 338.32 KB] 

DOWNLOAD OR ORDER POSTERS AND POSTCARDS

Download, print and display your own A3 posters or postcards on brain injury from falls, or contact Brain Injury Australia to place an order for professionally printed copies. 

(Brain Injury Australia gratefully acknowledges the volunteer work of graphic designer Kevin Bathman.)

Download this poster now [Adobe Acrobat PDF - 1.04 MB]

Download this poster now [Adobe Acrobat PDF - 591.04 KB]

Download postcard art now [Adobe Acrobat PDF - 77.1 KB]

"HEAD OVER HEELS" - BRAIN INJURY AUSTRALIA WRITES ON FALLS-RELATED BRAIN INJURY FOR THE NATIONAL SENIORS ASSOCIATION'S  '50 SOMETHING' MAGAZINE

"We all hear of hip fractures resulting from falls but what about brain injury? Nick Rushworth describes a growing and serious problem."

Download the article. [PDF file - 235.05 KB]

"FALLS-RELATED TRAUMATIC BRAIN INJURY IN YOUNG-OLD PEOPLE: UNDER-RECOGNISED, UNDER-DIAGNOSED, HIGHLY FATAL AND HIGHLY PREVENTABLE" - BRAIN INJURY AUSTRALIA'S PRESENTATION TO THE INTERNATIONAL FEDERATION ON AGEING 10TH GLOBAL CONFERENCE, MELBOURNE MAY 4

Due to population ageing, falls are now not only the leading cause of all injury hospitalisations throughout the developed world, but also the leading cause of Traumatic Brain Injury (TBI).  Even though fall-related injuries to the head are consistently the second most common after hip fracture, head trauma in older people is often overlooked in acute care and appropriate neurological assessment and monitoring forgotten. And though rates of falls-related injuries to the head are rising while those for hip fracture are falling, brain injury fails to feature in falls prevention programs.

This presentation outlined research findings from Brain Injury Australia’s policy paper on falls-related TBI recently completed for the Australian Government.  It will highlight the plight of the young-old - those aged between 60 and 80 - who are at the highest risk of TBI due to their active lifestyles. At the same time, this age group falls into a service gap – being both too old for rehabilitation aimed at return to work and too young for geriatric medical management.  Many in this age group are also at increasing risk of a "secondary" TBI after a fall - from bleeding in the brain – due to their use of anti-coagulant (blood thinning) medication to prevent stroke.

Brain Injury Australia, alongside organisations such as the US Centers for Disease Control’s National Center for Injury Prevention and Control, is campaigning for greater attention to be paid to the prevention and rehabilitation of TBI in older people. Specifically BIA argues that, as governments increase the retirement age in line with both enhanced life expectancy and pension costs, strict age-based criteria that limit access to brain injury-specific rehabilitation to those aged 65 years or under in Australia should be radically revised. 

Download the full presentation. [PowerPoint Slide Show - 6.39 MB]