Unreported Fall

[Danita Mc Donald]

What is the definition of an unreported fall in nurisng?

[FiremedicMike, BSN, RN, EMT-P]

The patient fell and you didn't fill out the appropriate paperwork.

[Danita Mc Donald]

Thank you for your reply.

Danita

[kbrn2002, ADN, RN]

An unreported fall happens when the nurse who would be responsible for initiating the fall investigation/paperwork does not do so despite knowing a fall did, or even might have occurred.  

This happened to a nurse I used to work with years back...a resident who was known to be a bit overdramatic self reported a fall, there were no witnesses to the fall and no apparent injury. The nurse decided that this resident was either exaggerating the incident or that it didn't happen at all and did nothing. The resident ended up in the ER several hours later, turns out she had a brain bleed. Likely this was related to the self reported fall that was not properly followed up on, though there is a possibly it was not.   Either way that nurse was terminated for not following the correct post fall policies and procedures The rumor  going around was that she was also reported to state for neglect though of course management would not confirm this. 

[Danita Mc Donald]

Thank you so much for all the information. I really appreciate all your help.

Take care, Danita

[Danita Mc Donald]

If a nurse doesn't follow protocol,  and her documentation is proof she didn't provide care, and supervisors do  not do anything about it?  Why would this happen?  Aren't they responsible to report unprofessional conduct? 

[FiremedicMike, BSN, RN, EMT-P]

You're going to have to tell us what happened if you want any real input on this conversation.  Vagueness is fine, but you are beyond vague and it's difficult to give advice with zero understanding of what happened.

[Tenebrae, BSN, RN]

FiremedicMike said:

The patient fell and you didn't fill out the appropriate paperwork.

Can also be that the patient fell and didn't report it. Had a few recently that were mobile but a massive high falls risk