CEC Falls White Paper attracts attention at international conference on fall prevention in Perth

8 December 2023

Fall Prevention in NSW White Paper 2023, the new seminal work on fall prevention in NSW from the CEC, received much attention and interest when national and international experts gathered in Perth last week.

The occasion was the 2023 Joint Conference of the Australia and New Zealand Falls Prevention Society & World Falls Congress where there was a national call to action to prevent falls. The CEC white paper was held up as an example of excellent work at the conference opening and at the subsequent Annual General Meeting of the Australia and New Zealand Falls Prevention Society.

The white paper on fall prevention was developed in collaboration with clinical experts, researchers, policymakers, consumers and other stakeholders. It highlights the scale of the issue, presents the evidence behind fall prevention approaches and provides 9 recommendations to guide healthcare providers, organisations, and policymakers in our shared mission to reduce falls and their associated harms.

The CEC's Lorraine Lovitt (Older Persons' Patient Safety Program) attended the Perth fall prevention conference and facilitated a half-day workshop on falls in hospital, promoting our approach Comprehensive Care – Minimising Harm. She delivered a conference presentation and supported a poster on the Quality Improvement work by CEC colleague Ingrid Hutchinson.

Expert fall researchers who supported the publication of the CEC Falls White Paper at the conference - Prof Cathie Sherrington, Prof Stephen Lord, Lorraine Lovitt, Prof Kim Delbaere, Dr Daina Sturnieks and Prof Anne Tiedemann.