Falls and Fractures: A Podcast with Sarah Berry
episode
GeriPal - A Geriatrics and Palliative Medicine Podcast
46 min
3 speakers
6 chapters
transcribed 9 hours ago
Transcript
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Transcript generated automatically by AI and may contain errors.
What is the overall impact of falls on older adults and why should clinicians care?
Welcome to the Jerry Powell podcast. This is Eric Huadera. This
is Alex Smith. And Alex,
who do we have with us today in studio?
In studio, visiting professor coming to us from Boston. She is a returning Jerry Powell guest. This is Sarah Berry, who is at the Hebrew Senior Life and Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center and Harvard Medical School. And she's a practicing geriatrician and researcher. Sarah, welcome back to the Jerry Powell podcast.
Thanks so much. Happy to be here.
So we're going to be talking about falls and fractures. We've got a lot to talk about. We've got a lot of questions. But before we do, Sarah, do you have a song request for Alex?
Ooh, how about Free Fallin'?
Free Fallin'. I was going to ask why you chose this song.
We did this like one of our first podcasts, I remember. And the second verse, I kind of went for it. But today I'm not because it is November 6th and I'm feeling subdued.
Subdued. We won't talk about what happened on November 5th.
So here's a little bit of subdued free-falling.
She's a good girl Loves her mama Loves Jesus And America too She's a good girl Crazy about Elvis Loves horses And her boyfriend too It's a long day, living in Reseda
There's a
freeway, running through the yard I'm a bad boy, cause I don't even miss her I'm a bad boy, for breaking her heart And I'm free Free falling. Said I'm free. Free falling.
Sarah, excellent song.
That was nice.
Choice. Is there any other reason you picked that song besides... Are you a Tom Petty fan?
I am a Tom Petty fan. But it was just the first thing that came to mind when you asked me to talk about falls.
Well, I want to thank you for joining us because you've done a lot of the studies around falls and fractures and like how we think about it, especially like in frailer, older adults, those in nursing homes. I wonder, how did you get interested in this as like a research academic focus of yours?
Yeah. You know, when I went into my geriatric fellowship or even during residency, I think that I thought that I was going to be interested in dementia and that maybe that would be my line of focus. But I was really struck early on in my training by the number of patients that had these serious falls, fractures, sort of this feeling that they were never going to get back home or they weren't going to get back home in the same shape that they were before. And I had a good mentor in residency that really encouraged me, you know, if you want to think about the problem, think about clinical research and was really fortunate to have great mentorship throughout my career.
Great. And when you think about like back then, I guess now too, like how big of a problem is Falls?
Yeah. It's a pretty big problem for older adults. I'd say in community dwellers, about one out of every three older adults falls each year. In the nursing home, that's higher. It's one out of two. Wow. I think the CDC estimates that every 20 minutes, an older adult dies from a fall-related injury. Wow. And many more are injured.
Yeah. And the big things that we think about as far as complications, so obviously the thing that comes to everybody's mind is like fractures. But there's other things too, right? Like increased social isolation because there's a fear of falling. Is that right?
Yeah, absolutely. Even the falls that don't result in a major injury like the fracture, the head traumas, even the falls without those tend to result in an increase in fear of falling, anxiety, and institutionalization.
Yeah. I wonder how much, because it's probably not brought up a lot in primary care settings. People don't ask about it. They don't screen about it. I'm guessing older adults don't bring it up frequently that they've fallen. So it's a silent, I don't want to say silent epidemic that's used too often, but there's silence around these falls. And there's probably some nihilism about kind of, oh, what can we do about falls anyways? Yeah.
I think all of that is true. I think there's just sort of this feeling that maybe it's inevitable because it happens so often. I think both the patients feel that.
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Chapters
6 chapters
1
What is the overall impact of falls on older adults and why should clinicians care?
0:00–7:27
2
How common are falls in community‑dwelling seniors versus nursing‑home residents?
7:27–15:00
3
What are the most effective screening questions to identify patients at risk for falls?
15:00–23:58
4
Which clinical risk factors and extrinsic hazards should be assessed when evaluating fall risk?
23:58–31:51
5
What evidence‑based interventions (exercise, home safety, vision, medications) reduce fall incidence?
31:51–39:21
6
Does vitamin D supplementation prevent falls or fractures in older adults?
39:21–46:45
Speakers
3 identifiedMore from GeriPal - A Geriatrics and Palliative Medicine Podcast
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