How to keep the elderly safe in slippery conditions

BOWLING GREEN, Ky.-If it’s slippery outside, it might be best to put off running errands until later. 

“As we age, the risk of an injury with a fall, continues to increase,” said Norton Healthcare and Norton Neuroscience Institute Physical Therapist Kaitlyn Drummond. 

With icy conditions in south central Kentucky, you want to make sure you take precautions to not slip and fall outside. 

Elderly populations are the most at risk for seriously injuring themselves as their bones are more brittle. 

“You can go from the extreme of a head injury to where if you’re on blood thinners it could progress into a bleed. Long bone injuries, we see a lot of elbows, and upper arm, humerus fractures, a lot of hip fractures,” said Med Center Health EMT Field Supervisor Stephen Parrott. 

You can help prevent falling by strengthening your balance. 

“Regular exercise is one of the best ways you can maintain or improve your balance. We see a lot in the elderly populations they’re doing a lot more sitting so their muscles are getting weaker,” said Drummond. 

If you need to go outside, there’s some precautions you can take to prevent a fall.. 

“Take your cell phone with you. If you’re using an emergency light such as a life alert make sure that is on you at all times. Open toe shoes or open heeled shoes have the tendency to let you slip out or move around in the shoe so we highly recommend doing closed toed shoes and something with a good tread on the bottom,” said Drummond. 

If you see someone older who has fallen and can’t get up, call 911 immediately. 

“If you obviously see a fracture or they’re complaining of a hip or lower leg pain or whatever or they seem to be not themselves at the time whether they’re unconscious at the time you found them or whatever you need to leave them be until we get there,” said Parrott.