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IN 2007 THE CENTERS FOR Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) examined Medicare data on the number of Medicare beneficiaries who fell out of bed. In 2006, there were 2,591 cases reported of Medicare patients who fell out of bed. The patients who fell had an average charge for the hospital stay of $24,962 with 175,000 fractures or other traumatic injuries (CMS, 2007). In 2001, some 1.6 million elders were treated in hospital emergency departments and 373,000 were hospitalized for fall injuries (Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, 2002). The total direct cost of all fall injuries for people 65 and older in 2002 was slightly more than $19 billion: ($179 million for fatal falls and...
