Investigating the Effect of Education in Reducing Environmental Hazards at Home for the Elderly

Falling is one of the most common and serious health problems, especially at home among the elderly. The purpose of this research is to investigate the effect of education in reducing environmental hazards at home for the elderly.

In this quasi-experimental study, 200 elderly people were equally divided into intervention and control groups in 2018. The educational intervention was performed in 4 sessions of 45 mins. Data were collected through a standardized home safety checklist during interviews and home visits before and after six months of the training intervention. SPSS software (v19) analyzed the collected data. Chi-squared, Mann Whitney, Wilcoxon, and Exact Tests were used in this study.

The results showed that the mean score of all dimensions of home safety increased in the intervention group compared to the control group after the intervention. Except for the safety dimensions of external stairs and kitchen, this difference was statistically significant (P <0.05). The findings also showed a significant decrease in the percentage of falls in the intervention group compared to the control group after educational interventions (P <0.05).

Educational intervention is useful in reducing home environmental hazards in the elderly and makes the elderly less likely to fall during their daily activities.