Domestic accidents with elderly assisted in an urgency hospital

Abstract

A cross-sectional study conducted in a reference urgency hospital constituted by a convenience sample, which data were collected from June to July of 2014. The aim was to analyze domestic accidents with elderly assisted in a public urgency hospital. From all 83 interviewed, 77.1% were women, aged 80 to 89 years (32.5%), illiterate (32.5%), widowed (44.6%), living with a partner and other family members (73.5%), retired (84.4%), who received one to two minimal wages (88%). The prevalence of domestic accidents was 6.4%, with predominance of falls (84.4%), from their own height (55.6%). The lack of care observing the environment was self-reported as the main cause (45.8%) of accidents. Lack of association between the occurrence of falls, the existence of chronic diseases, continuous medication use and, to be performing an activity at the moment of accident was an important finding. We recommend multi-professional care with broad functional assessment identifying elderly deficiencies and environmental limitations, aiming at community guidance and planning of integrated interventions.