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Cáritas Coimbra participated as a speaker at the 9^th Colloquium: Ageing, Health and Citizenship, promoted by the Scientific-Pedagogical Unit of Elderly People Nursing, of the Nursing School of Coimbra (ESEnfC). The meeting took place last October 25^th, at ESEnfC.

Carina Dantas, Innovation Department’s Director, represented Cáritas Coimbra in this Colloquium and was part of the panel that discussed the theme “Interdisciplinary Approaches to Preventing the Risk of Falling”. During the intervention, it was presented the Best Practice Handbook on falls prevention in the older people, elucidating those present with practical suggestions and advice on small changes in day-to-day management that can be significant in preventing domestic accidents.

Falls are one of the main causes of hospitalization. It is also due to this reality that the Portuguese National Plan for Patient Safety 2015-2020 has as one of its objectives “Preventing the Occurrence of Falls”.

In order to keep people safe and independent in their own home and to offer possible solutions, Cáritas Coimbra has developed, jointly with the University of Coimbra (Anamélia Almeida, Anabela Mota Pinto, Paulo Nossa and Carina Dantas), the Best Practice Handbook – Preventing falls in older people, as part of its participation in various national and international projects.

Integrated into its startegy  for promoting active and healthy ageing, this Handbook aims to transfer scientific and academic knowledge to the community by creating practical and useful tools that older people, as well as their caregivers, can use in their daily lives. To this end, the Best Practice Handbook is divided into 4 parts: risk factor identification, fall prevention, home safety checklist and types of walking aids.

The colloquium “Ageing, Health and Citizenship” allowed the reflection of this theme based on the research already carried out, debating the determinants of accidents with the older people and the magnitude of the challenges facing the Portuguese population.