New Lighting System Cut Nursing Home Resident Fall Risk By 43%: A study entitled Impact of Upgraded Lighting on Falls in Care Home Residents published on July 15, 2022 in The Journal of Post Acute and Long Term Care Medicine reported: “Before the lighting upgrade, the rate of falls was similar between experimental and control sites [6.94 vs 6.62 falls per 1000 resident-days, respectively; rate ratio (RR) 1.05; 95% CI 0.70–1.58; P = .82]. Following the upgrade, falls were reduced by 43% at experimental sites compared with control sites (4.82 vs 8.44 falls per 1000 resident-days, respectively; RR 0.57; 95% CI 0.39–0.84; P = .004) … Upgrading ambient lighting to incorporate higher intensity blue-enriched white light during the daytime and lower intensity overnight represents an effective, passive, low-cost, low-burden addition to current preventive strategies to reduce fall risk in long-term care settings.
The two-year study conducted by investigators at Brigham and Women’s Hospital and the Midwest Lighting Institute (MLI) involved lighting that was operated on a schedule developed by Midwest Light Institute that implements specific spectrum and intensity levels timed to regularize sleep-wake cycles and boost the daytime alerting effects of light.
The observational study examined two pairs of nursing homes (four sites total) with 758 residents. One site from each pair was selected for a solid-state tunable lighting system upgrade throughout the facility, while the other site served as a control. At the experimental sites, the intensity and spectrum were changed throughout the day to increase exposure to short-wavelength (blue light) during the day (6 a.m. to 6 p.m.) and decrease it overnight (6 p.m. to 6 a.m.). Intensity and spectrum did not change throughout the day at the control sites with standard lighting. The number of falls was aggregated from medical records covering approximately 126,000 resident days to compare the rate of falls per 1,000 resident days between the experimental and control conditions.
An investigator in the Division of Sleep and Circadian Disorders at Brigham and Women’s Hospital and Assistant Professor of Medicine at Harvard Medical School stated, “Falls among care home residents have major health and economic implications, and this study is the first of its kind to translate the known beneficial effects of tunable lighting on neurocognitive responses into a real-world setting and examine if changes in lighting spectrum and intensity throughout the day can reduce the risk of falls in the elderly. We found that upgrading ambient lighting is a safe, effective, low-cost, low-burden preventative strategy to reduce fall risk in long-term care settings, one that has tremendous potential to save lives and improve patients’ health and well-being.”
Falls are the leading cause of injury-related death in U.S. adults aged 65 and older, with fatal falls estimated to cost $754 million annually and non-fatal falls estimated to cost $50 billion annually.
If you or a loved one suffered injuries (or worse) while a resident of a nursing home in the United States due to a nursing home fall or a nursing home failing to properly care for a vulnerable adult, you should promptly find a nursing home claim lawyer in your state who may investigate your nursing home claim for you and file a nursing home claim on your behalf or on behalf of your loved one, if appropriate.
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