Location of Elderly Admitted Fallers

Evaluation of balance in fallers and non-fallers elderly.

UNLABELLED Falls present a substantial health problem among the elderly population. Approximately one-third of community-dwelling people over 65 years of age will experience one or more each year. OBJECTIVE The purpose of this study was to evaluate balance between fallers and non-fallers elderly. STUDY DESIGN Clinical study. METHODS We studied 30 subjects older than 65 years of age. 15 su...

Gait Abnormalities in Elderly Fallers

The objective of this study was to measure gait abnormalities in elderly fallers with the LocometrixTM gait-analysis system. This accelerometric device provided the following gait variables: walking speed and stride frequency, length, symmetry, and regularity. The variables were analyzed over a 20-s period of stable walking on a flat track of 40 m. Participants were 20 elderly patients hospital...

Rare express saccades in elderly fallers

OBJECTIVE To examine horizontal saccades in elderly subjects with falling history; prior extensive screening was done to recruit subjects with falling history in the absence of pathology. METHODS Twelve elderly with falling history were tested. Two testing conditions were used: the gap (fixation target extinguishes prior to target onset) and the overlap (fixation stays on after target onset) ...

Vitamin D supplement intake in elderly fallers.

To the Editor: Approximately 30% of ambulatory older adults fall yearly; 5% to 10% are seriously injured. Vitamin D deficiency increases body sway and decreases muscle mass and strength, increasing falls risk. Vitamin D supplementation reduces falls by 11% to 22%. To our knowledge, no studies have been conducted that report characteristics of ambulatory fallers associated with meeting the recom...

Postural balance measures in elderly fallers