Hip Protectors

Hip fractures are a significant health risk for seniors. Hip fractures in long-term care residents may be reduced by preventing and treating osteoporosis, preventing falls, and by using hip protectors. Hip protectors are garments or undergarments with pockets for protective pads that protect the hips in the case of a fall.

The Canadian Agency for Drugs and Technologies in Health (CADTH) conducted a pilot project to provide policy guidance and an implementation tool on hip protectors in long-term care facilities. The policy guidance and implementation tool are based primarily on an evidence synthesis conducted by CADTH and on input by a panel of Canadian experts.

The guidance card implementation tool is mainly intended for staff at long-term care facilities but may be of interest to health professionals in general, as well as those working within a health ministry, health region, or hospital.

• Guidance Card
• Policy Guidance
• FAQs

CADTH Evidence

• Hip Protectors in Long-Term Care: A Clinical and Cost-Effectiveness Review and Primary Economic Evaluation CADTH Rapid Review, 2008
• Hip Protectors in Long-Term Care Podcast 2008
• Hip Protectors in Long-Term Care: Clinical and Cost-Effectiveness
  CADTH Rapid Review (Update), 2010

Other Resources

This listing is not intended to be all-inclusive or to imply endorsement by CADTH.

• Safer Healthcare Now! Falls Intervention
• Finding Balance Alberta
• Institute for Healthcare Improvement Reducing Harm from Falls
• Registered Nurses' Association of Ontario: Prevention of Falls and Fall Injuries in the Older Adult
• Mississauga Halton Falls Prevention Project
• BC Injury Research and Prevention Unit:
  
  • Falls Prevention
  • Drugs and the Risk of Falling
• Centre of Excellence on Mobility, Fall Prevention and Injury in Aging (CEMFIA), British Columbia
• Cochrane: Interventions for Preventing Falls in Older People in Nursing Care Facilities and Hospitals
• Neurology: Practice Parameter: Assessing Patients in a Neurology Practice for Risk of Falls (an evidence-based review)
• Journal of Gerontology: MEDICAL SCIENCES: Predictors of Adherence with the Recommended Use of Hip Protectors

Further questions or feedback?

Please contact requests@cadth.ca