Gatton Faculty receive a $50,000 Interdisciplinary Grant from ETSUs Research Development Council
Drs. Walls, Panus, Odle, Covert, and Karpen from Gatton College of Pharmacy and Dr. Courtney Hall who has positions at ETSU’s Physical Therapy department and the Mountain Home VA have received a $50,000 Interdisciplinary Grant from ETSU’s Research Development Council to study fall risk in older adults. Dr. Hall is the Principal Investigator on the award.
Each year, 2.5 million people 65 and older are treated in emergency departments for falls, resulting in over 700,000 hospitalizations. Falls are among the 20 most expensive medical conditions, with an average hospital cost for a fall-related injury of $35,000, leading to an estimated burden of 34 billion dollars annually on the health care system. Thus fall prevention is one of the highest priorities among those involved in geriatric care. Identification of individuals that are most at risk for falls would provide more targeted and efficient interventions, however, a quick, cheap, and easy metric for assessing fall risk is not available. Through their collaborative efforts, Drs Walls et al. have developed two different drug indices: the Quantitative Drug Index (QDI), which was generated using the interdisciplinary clinical expertise of pharmacists and physical therapists, and the Medication-based Index of Physical function (MedIP), which was derived computationally using “big data” analytics. Both of these indices could be used to quickly and cheaply assess fall risk in older adults.
The funds from this proposal will establish a new interdisciplinary group of researchers that includes investigators from the College of Pharmacy and the Mountain Home VA Hospital. This is an important step in increasing the collaborative potential between ETSU and the VA, and the research group will continue to serve as a model for similar research efforts between these two institutions. This research will increase the visibility of these novel indices among the research and clinical communities, and generate sufficient preliminary data for external funding applications. Ultimately, introduction of these indices into clinical practice will improve health care and reduce costs for millions of older individuals.
