If you’re considering assisted living, you may have heard the term “hip fracture” used. This can be scary to hear, but it’s important to understand what this means and why it’s important. Fracturing your hip is a serious injury for older adults because of the high risk of complications if not appropriately treated in the hospital or at home after surgery. In this article, we’ll discuss how assisted living communities in Landis, NC protects their residents from hip fractures and what steps everyone over 65 should take to stay safe!
Proper Lighting Throughout The Community
Proper lighting is essential to preventing falls. The light fixtures and their placement should be bright enough to light the path of travel, whether in hallways or other areas where residents walk most often. Make sure no dark spots could lead a resident into an unsafe situation. Motion sensors can turn on lights automatically when someone approaches them at night, which will help prevent falls when walking through unfamiliar areas like parking lots or hallways after dark.
Handrails On All Stairwells
Handrails are an essential safety feature of all stairwells inside and outside assisted living communities. As such, you’ll want to ensure a handrail on at least one side of every stairway throughout your community. Handrails should be placed at a comfortable height for the resident who will use them most frequently—for example, people with arthritis may need lower handrails due to their limited mobility.
Grab Bars In The Bathroom
Grab bars are a great way to help you get in and out of the shower. They can also be used for support when standing up from a chair or toilet, and they can be placed in areas that are hard to reach without assistance. Many assisted living communities to have grab bars installed near every sink and toilet so residents can use them when needed.
Your loved one could also benefit from having multiple grab bars installed throughout the house, so he or she doesn’t have to walk far just to use them. This will allow him or her more independence when moving around the home, which is especially important after hip surgery recovery time ends because it allows him or her more flexibility while recovering from surgery, but still has some pain associated with it until all pain goes away completely after surgery has healed completely (which could take weeks).
Grab bars should always be installed where they make sense using common sense reasoning: no matter where it’s at in your home – including bathrooms – only install one if there’s actually something nearby that needs grabbing onto!
Well-Maintained Flooring That Is Slip-Resistant And Free Of Hazards
One of the most important steps to protect yourself from hip fractures is to avoid slipping and falling. Slipping and falling increases your risk of hip fracture by 300%, according to a study by the Centers for Disease Control (CDC). The flooring in your assisted living community should be slip-resistant, making it easy for you to walk on without losing traction.
Flooring that is not slip-resistant can cause other injuries, including back and head injuries. The CDC also found that older adults who suffered a fall were more likely than singles in the same age group to end up in the hospital or die within two years of their fall; this underscores how important assisted living communities are to ensure they have safe flooring throughout the community.
Finally, it’s crucial that your assisted living community maintain its floors so they are free from hazards—like debris or obstructions—that could cause someone walking on them an injury. If anything is blocking the path you’re walking down, or something has fallen off one of the shelves nearby (and landed on the pathway), remove it immediately! It’s better to be safe than sorry.
Conclusion
We hope you’ve found this article helpful in understanding how assisted living communities can help protect you from a hip fracture. If you or someone you love is approaching the age when they may need assistance living at home, call us today so we can discuss how our services could be of use.