Health Care Professionals' Attitudes and Compliance to Clinical Practice Guidelines to Prevent Falls and Fall Injuries

Background: Clinical practice guidelines (CPGs) aimed at preventing falls and fall injuries have been shown to be effective in acute care hospitals. However, although CPGs are systematically developed and evidence-based tools, there has been a problem with their implementation in clinical practice. Aim: To describe influences on health care professionals' attitudes to CPGs for preventing falls and fall injuries. Methods: A qualitative approach was chosen and five focus group discussions were conducted, which included physicians, nurses, physiotherapists, and occupational therapists. The transcribed texts were analyzed using manifest and latent content analysis. Findings: Two main categories emerged: experiencing a course of events and influence of social factors. Experiencing a course of event included incidence of falls and fall injuries followed by negative consequences, which revealed benefits of using a CPG. Influence of social factors for implementation and compliance with the CPG was described as community obligations and organizational and individual resources. Conclusions: The findings confirm the complex process of implementation and compliance of CPGs for fall prevention. A relation between experiences of high incidence of falls with negative consequences and a positive attitude and compliance to CPGs appeared. To assure compliance and a positive attitude requires an obvious benefit of the CPG in reducing falls. Factors to overcome barriers to implementation and compliance seem to be a supportive leadership, systematic evaluations of the CPG outcome, and the facilitator role.