NURS FPX 4035 Assessment 1
[Student Name]
Capella University
Professor’s Name
August 2025
NURS FPX 4035 Assessment 1: Enhancing Quality and Safety
A serious safety concern is the frequency of falls that occur among patients in healthcare facilities, especially among older people. To improve patient outcomes and reduce medical costs, effective preventative actions are essential. Nurses are also essential in planning the fall prevention program and working with other healthcare professionals to implement evidence-based measures. The NURS FPX 4035 Assessment 1 will cover the factors that contribute to patient falls, how to prevent them, and how nurses can enhance patient safety while reducing expenses.
Factors Leading to Patient Falls
Patient falls in care settings can result from a variety of risks, including environmental and internal ones. With respect to safety and quality, numerous inherent variables that predispose individuals to falls include old age, cognitive impairments, and chronic illnesses. Others, including senior citizens, struggle to maintain their coordination and balance, which makes them more likely to fall (Ainani & Irwan, 2024). Furthermore, medications associated with dizziness or hypotension (e.g., sedatives or antihypertensives) contributed to the incidence of falls because they affect the stability of the patient (Ainani & Irwan, 2024). Also, the environmental risk factors like the use of a moist floor, poor lighting, changes in bed height, etc., increase the risk probability of falls (Ainani & Irwan, 2024).
Additionally, hospital characteristics play a major role in the prevalence of falls. Low staffing levels, poor patient observation, long waits, and inaccurate assessments are all factors that lead to declining risks when it comes to the concepts of quality and patient safety (Najafpour et al., 2019). As mentioned in NURS FPX 4035 Assessment 1, the risk is also likely to increase because of the lack of communication between medical staff or the lack of education
concerning the necessity to prevent falls. Patients also need to change their positions in fairly strange hospital environments, which may impose physical burdens on people and potentially transfer them without proper support, exposing them to the risk of falls, according to quality and safety training offered to nurses (Najafpour et al., 2019). NURS FPX 4035 Assessment 1 freely reports that a problem and willingness to prevent fall-related diseases that may arise in medical facilities due to the environment and individual factors should be addressed.
Evidence-Based and Best-Practice Solutions
A series of evidence-based best practices and intervention programs were developed and implemented in hospitals to achieve success in reducing patient falls, which will add more safety and quality and reduce the expenditure of medical care. One of the solutions would be to standardize risk evaluation of falls per patient at the time of admission, during treatment, and observation. Mobility, cognitive ability, use of prescription medication, and frequency of previous falls are some of the other factors that should be considered at the stage of customizing the necessary preventive procedures (LeLaurin & Shorr, 2019). By identifying the high-risk patient early, the hospital can implement practices to alter the high-risk patient’s characteristics, such as, use of assistive devices, alteration of medication, and closer monitoring. This improves quality and patient safety and has already been noticed to decrease the number of falls (Morris et al., 2022).
Another effective approach discussed in NURS FPX 4035 Assessment 1 is the creation of the multidisciplinary fall prevention team that gathers healthcare specialists of various fields, including nurses, physical therapists, and pharmacists. To illustrate, providing patients with bed alarms, a dry floor, and call bells may help them prevent falling (Turner et al., 2020). As per
systematic assessments, the most effective interventions to decrease the number of falls include staff training, patient education, and environmental changes (Morris et al., 2022).
Processes can also be standardized, and the ongoing activity can be measured in the fall prevention training of their overall staff. This would lead to consistency among the hospital departments and aid in the aspects of quality and safety in nursing. The most crucial cost implications occur due to post-hospital-related readmissions related to falls. The research indicates that whenever the standardized practices are put in place in various units of the hospital, they reduce the number of falls and minimize healthcare expenses (Turner et al., 2020). Incorporating electronic health records (EHR) into real-time fall risk assessment and intervention can help expedite monitoring and response tactics to enhance patient safety and ultimately save long-term care costs (LeLaurin & Shorr, 2019). The hospitals will increase patient safety and reduce the financial cost of patient falls by giving priority to the evidence-based solutions, as emphasized in NURS FPX 4035 Assessment 1.
Nurse Coordination
In the area of falls, nurses play a vital role in planning treatment to save costs and improve patient safety. One of the most well-known instances of the help that nurses may offer is the implementation of fall prevention programs for senior citizens. According to Ojo and Thiamwong (2022), preventative strategies like nurse-led programs that include risk assessment, risk management education, and personalized care plans significantly reduce the risk of falls among the elderly. As stressed in quality and safety education for nurses, nurses can be in a good position to keep an eye on patients’ mobility, cognitive function, and other risk profiles. They can also make sure that any follow-up, such as a medication change or a referral to a physical therapist, happens as soon as possible. As stated in NURS FPX 4035 Assessment 1,
they ensure patient safety through fall prevention, which reduces the expense of treating fall-related injuries, absence, and rehabilitation delay. This is because patients frequently sustain injuries that are expensive to treat. Additionally, nurses can facilitate communication between multidisciplinary teams and ensure uniformity across various fall prevention strategies. Nurses may ensure that fall risk factors are adequately communicated and that all team members are aware of unique patient needs since they serve as coordinators between patients, their families, and other healthcare providers. For instance, nurses can plan staff training, environmental modifications, and assistive device use based on frequent patient assessments and updates (Turner et al., 2020). As covered in NURS FPX 4035 Assessment 1 and supported by the Patient Safety and Quality Improvement Act, this multidisciplinary approach lowers healthcare costs associated with falls and fall-related consequences by reducing errors.
Stakeholders to Coordinate with Nurses
In order to improve safety and quality and reduce patient falls, nurses will be essential in coordinating care with other stakeholders. Physicians will be a significant stakeholder group since they can provide vital medical supervision, administer relevant therapies, and prescribe the right medications that can affect the risk of falls. In order to identify high-risk patients early and modify their treatment plan, nurses collaborate with doctors. For example, patients who take medications that cause dizziness or hypotension would be closely monitored, and any changes to their regimen should be communicated as soon as possible (Ojo & Thiamwong, 2022). Collaboration between nurses and doctors will guarantee the creation and execution of thorough and customized care plans, which is crucial for preventing falls.
Another important group of stakeholders is physical therapists (PTs), who play a key role in assessing and improving patients’ mobility, as stressed in quality and safety education for nurses
Nurses and physical therapists work together to create rehabilitation plans that are specifically designed to help patients become stronger and enhance their coordination and balance, which helps them avoid falls. As highlighted in NURS FPX 4035 Assessment 1, a patient’s regular physical gait evaluation of a patient can help nurses understand the need to offer extra techniques to overcome poor gait, such as supportive devices and mobility aids (Turner et al., 2020). Environmental services personnel also contribute to ensuring the quality and safety in the nursing environment by ensuring maintenance of secure bed height, non-slippery floors, and sufficient lighting. The criterion in terms of fall prevention and patient safety is a cross-sectional communication between nurses and patient safety.
Conclusion
Overall, patient falls are a significant risk in hospitals, and with the combined efforts of medical staff, it is evident that remarkable advancements in general health safety and cost-effectiveness may be made. In order to enhance quality and patient safety, nurses should play a key role in starting a fall prevention program, including screening of high-risk patients and obtaining medical advice from doctors. As stated in NURS FPX 4035 Assessment 1, the healthcare setting can use evidence-based practices and collaboration to prevent fall events. These strategies are linked to better patient care and less burden on the healthcare system.
References
Ainani, N., & Irwan, A. M. (2024). Factors associated with patient falls in hospitals: A scoping review. Journal of Integrative Nursing, 6(2), 117-126. https://doi.org/10.4103/jin.jin_133_23
LeLaurin, J. H., & Shorr, R. I. (2019). Preventing falls in hospitalized patients. Clinics in Geriatric Medicine, 35(2), 273–283. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.cger.2019.01.007
Morris, M. E., Webster, K., Jones, C., Hill, A. M., Haines, T., McPhail, S., … & Cameron, I. (2022). Interventions to reduce falls in hospitals: A systematic review and meta- analysis. Age and Ageing, 51(5), afac077. https://doi.org/10.1093/ageing/afac077
Najafpour, Z., Godarzi, Z., Arab, M., & Yaseri, M. (2019). Risk factors for falls in hospital in- patients: A prospective nested case-control study. International Journal of Health Policy and Management, 8(5), 300-306. https://doi.org/10.15171/ijhpm.2019.11
Ojo, E. O., & Thiamwong, L. (2022). Effects of nurse-led fall prevention programs for older adults: a systematic review. Pacific Rim international journal of nursing research, 26(3),417. https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/36051891/
Turner, K., Staggs, V. https://doi.org/10.1093/ageing/afac077 S., Potter, C., Cramer, E., Shorr, R. I., & Mion, L. C. (2020). Fall prevention practices and implementation strategies: Examining consistency across hospital units. Journal of Patient Safety, 18(1), e236-e242. https://doi.org/10.1097/pts.0000000000000758
