A Self-Report Home Environment Screening Tool for Screening Fall Risk in Iranian Elder Homes

Abstract

Objectives Older people are at risk of falling and its complications more than other age groups. Evaluation of environmental hazards requires time and money. So it seems necessary to design a self-report questionnaire for initial screening. This study aims to develop a self-report tool for falling risk assessment in Iranian older people. Methods & Materials After approval of the Ethics Committee of Iran University of Medical Sciences, an expert group prepared and wrote the study items using simple words and fluent structure. The reliability of the questionnaire was evaluated through test-retest method and its validity through content validity method. The elders were residents in their homes and had the appropriate level of consciousness to understand and respond to Persian sentences correctly. Information was collected through questionnaires and observations. Statistical evaluation was performed by SPSS version 16, and the retest test reliability of the questionnaire was determined by intra-class correlation coefficient. Results In terms of content validity, Content Validity Ratio (CVR) formula was used, and the agreement between the experts was significant, so the questionnaire has good content validity. Test-retest reliability was calculated by Standard Error of Mean (SEM), and relative and absolute repeatability coefficients showed excellent reliability of this questionnaire. The validity of the questionnaire was calculated based on the Spearman correlation coefficient of 0.95 and P-value less than 0.001. The questionnaire contained 15 main questions and 75 sub-questions about the dangers of the home environment. Conclusion The results of this study showed high validity and reliability of this questionnaire, so it can be used as a practical tool for identifying the risks of falling at home.

Predictive validity of three home fall hazard assessment tools for older adults in Thailand

“…Although the internal validation using the bootstrap optimism-corrected C-statistics showed that the possibility of overfitting and optimism was low, external validation in the independent study population is needed [ 52 ]. In terms of the Modified HOME FAST-SR, the finding that its predictive validity was similar to three forms of the Thai-HFHAT assessments also implied that this instrument was well applicable to the international context, as indicated by the fact that a number of investigators had applied this instrument to their home countries [ 14 – 16 , 53 , 54 ].…”