Development and Validation of a Fall Prevention Knowledge Test

Abstract

Falls are a serious, persistent problem in hospitals. Ensuring that all hospital staff have adequate knowledge of how to prevent falls is the first step in prevention. We identified validated fall prevention knowledge tests (FPKTs) and planned to conduct a systematic literature review. When the review identified a lack of FPKTs, we developed and evaluated a FPKT, confirmed its conceptual framework, identified the content domain, drafted test items, devised the format, selected items for empirical examination, and conducted a psychometric evaluation. We randomly divided a 209‐subject data set into test and validation samples to make item reduction decisions and examine reliability and validity. The typical respondent was a white, 42‐year old female nurse with a bachelor's degree and 7 years' experience. Subjects were confident in their ability to prevent falls, rating themselves an 8 on a self‐efficacy scale of 1 (not at all) to 10 (very). The 11‐item FPKT scale (range 0–11) attained a tetrachoric coefficient of 0.73, confirming initial reliability. FPKT mean scores obtained before and after fall prevention education improved from 5.1 ± 1.8 to 6.6 ± 1.7. Statistically significant differences (paired t‐test = 12.4, p < .001) confirmed validity. A robust way to assess nurses' knowledge of fall prevention is needed to inform effective educational programs. Addressing gaps in validated FPKTs provides an opportunity to inform and evaluate effective fall prevention programs. J Am Geriatr Soc 67:133–138, 2019.

Development and Validation of a Fall Prevention Efficiency Scale

“…We found that nurses in both qualitative and quantitative phases rated their confidence to prevent falls as high (Table 1). Although this agrees with a recent assessment of self-efficacy for preventing patients from falling obtained when testing a Fall Prevention Knowledge Test, 26 despite nurses’ confidence, patients continue to fall. Patients fall when individual fall prevention plans are not tailored to address specific actionable risk factors and/or are not carried out consistently by stakeholders 27 .…”

Adoption of a Patient-Tailored Fall Prevention Program in Academic Health Systems: A Qualitative Study of Barriers and Facilitators

“…The adoption of Fall TIPS also resulted in the first-time use of clinical decision support to identify patient-tailored fall prevention interventions. Fall prevention programs have traditionally relied on staff expertise to develop patients' fall prevention plans [6] despite studies showing that staff have poor mean fall prevention knowledge scores (5.1 ± 1.8 out of 11) [23], and that staff's selection of fall prevention interventions lacks evidence [24]. In contrast, the interventions articulated in Fall TIPS are based upon the 6-item Morse Fall Scale (MFS) [25].…”

Turkish adaptation of the Fall Prevention Knowledge Test

“…The test developed by Dykes et al ( 2019) is a "true and false" test and it consists of 11 items 14 . This test was developed to evaluate the nurse's knowledge of fall prevention for hospitalized individuals and was designed to form the basis for necessary educational interventions.…”

“…It is expected that nurses should provide answers with an accuracy rate of 80% or higher. Nurses, who provide correct answers at or above 80%, are considered to have good knowledge of fall prevention, whereas those who score below this threshold need to improve their knowledge on this topic 14 .…”

“…One of the patient safety objectives published by the International Joint Commission is to prevent patient falls 13 . Ensuring that all hospital staff have sufficient knowledge about preventing falls is the first step to be taken regarding fall prevention 14 . During the delivery of healthcare services within hospitals, it is very important to ensure a safe healthcare environment to prevent falls that may result from errors.…”