Home Safety for Older Adults

• Aging and accidents
  • Physical changes with age
  • Top five ways to stay safe at home
  • How to protect yourself
• Room-by-room safety inventory
• Prevent falls
  • Address physiological factors
  • Improve balance and strength
  • Tackle home hazards
• Prevent poisoning and medication errors
  • Medication overdoses and interactions
  • Carbon monoxide poisoning
  • Food poisoning
  • Chemical poisoning
• Prevent fires and burns
  • Physiological factors
  • Protect yourself from fires and burns

• Prevent other common injuries
  • Choking and suffocation
  • Firearm injuries
  • Blunt traumas and lacerations
  • Overexertion
• Protect against intruders
  • General advice
  • Apartment dwellers
  • Home owners and renters
• Natural disasters and terrorist attacks
  • Step 1: Collect disaster supplies
  • Step 2: Create a portable supply kit
  • Step 3: Develop and practice an emergency plan
• Glossary
• Resources

What are you doing to stay healthy? Chances are you’re already keeping an eye on your weight and blood pressure, trying to eat right, and working to stay fit. But have you taken a look at what’s inside your medicine cabinet lately? Have you tested your smoke alarm to see if it still works? Have you had your vision or balance tested recently? Taking steps to make your home safe can be just as important to your chance of living a long and healthy life as watching your cholesterol levels.

Accidents at home tend to occur because of a combination of intrinsic factors—physiological qualities such as poor eyesight or insufficient blood pressure—and extrinsic factors such as poor lighting in a stairway or an inadequately grounded electrical circuit. Intrinsic factors often develop as people get older, but may come on so gradually that you don’t notice them until you have an accident. You can modify some intrinsic factors (getting an updated eyeglass prescription, for example), and you can learn to compensate for those that can’t be changed. Most extrinsic factors involved in home accidents are structural and can be fixed, provided you are alert to potential dangers.

This report will show you how to implement a comprehensive home safety plan that pays attention to both the intrinsic and extrinsic factors that may be putting you at risk for an accidental injury. You’ll learn how to address or compensate for the typical physiological changes that occur with age. You’ll find out about the most common types of home accidents and how to avoid them, or how to administer first aid if they occur. Because details can sometimes be overwhelming, this report also contains a list of the top five things you can do to keep yourself safe at home and provides a room-by-room inventory of top safety concerns. Remember that health, like charity, begins at home.