Falls survey

I have just completed the falls survey sent to me via e mail. I feel that an opportunity has been missed in this survey to raise awareness of the falls risk caused by or enhanced by the medication being taken by many fallers. I am a retired pharmacist and was part of the original working group for NICE and the guidance for falls prevention. We also developed tools for risk assessment within Colchester to evaluate the risk that prescribed and OTC medication may have. This work requires time and sadly, with less pharmacist time available, is still not carried out routinely, either in acute or community settings. I feel that the survey could have asked if any medication review had taken place after a fall to give a picture of the current situation. The recent growth of pharmacists working within GP practices would provide a golden opportunity for such work to be done to reduce falls incidence, particularly after the first fall.