# De-Implementing Fall Prevention Alarms in Hospitals

> **NIH NIH R01** · UNIVERSITY OF FLORIDA · 2023 · $588,347

## Abstract

Title: De-Implementing Fall Prevention Alarms in Hospitals
Inpatient falls result in significant physical and economic burdens to patients (increased injury
and mortality rates and decreased quality of life) as well as to medical organizations (increased
lengths of stay, medical care costs, and litigation). The Centers for Medicare & Medicaid
Services (CMS) considers falls with injury a “never event”— an error in medical care that
indicates a real problem in the safety and credibility of a health care institution. Hospitals are no
longer reimbursed for extra costs incurred in the diagnosis and management of inpatient fall-
related injuries. Thus, because patient falls are common, costly and interpreted as poor care
quality, hospitals are highly incentivized to prevent them.
Alarm systems are designed to reduce falls by alerting staff when patients attempt to leave a
bed or chair without assistance. There is now strong evidence from our group and others that
alarms are ineffective as a fall prevention maneuver in hospitals. Despite this, our group has
recently shown that more than one-third of hospital patients are undergoing fall prevention alarm
monitoring. In nursing homes, CMS regulates the use of fall prevention alarms as it does
physical restraints. Instructions to nursing home surveyors state these devices should be used
only when medically necessary and continuously reevaluated.
Guided by the Choosing Wisely De-implementation Framework, this project will generate a
generalizable approach using coaching and tailored de-implementation strategies to reduce use
of fall prevention alarms in hospitals. We will conduct a hybrid II implementation study in 30
medical or medical-surgical units from US non-federal hospitals participating in the National
Database of Nursing Quality Indicators. Findings from this study could also support future trials
aimed at de-implementing low-quality alarm use in other care settings with known high fall rates
(e.g., stroke care, cancer care). Evaluation of high versus low intensity coaching addresses an
urgent need to evaluate use of tailored strategies and to establish effective thresholds for
coaching within health service settings that have varying resources to support de-
implementation efforts

## Key facts

- **NIH application ID:** 10698056
- **Project number:** 5R01AG073408-02
- **Recipient organization:** UNIVERSITY OF FLORIDA
- **Principal Investigator:** Molly McNett
- **Activity code:** R01 (R01, R21, SBIR, etc.)
- **Funding institute:** NIH
- **Fiscal year:** 2023
- **Award amount:** $588,347
- **Award type:** 5
- **Project period:** 2022-09-15 → 2026-08-31

## Primary source

NIH RePORTER: https://reporter.nih.gov/project-details/10698056

## Citation

> US National Institutes of Health, RePORTER application 10698056, De-Implementing Fall Prevention Alarms in Hospitals (5R01AG073408-02). Retrieved via AI Analytics 2026-05-22 from https://api.ai-analytics.org/grant/nih/10698056. Licensed CC0.

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