Have you already seen the article from the New York Times? You can hardly ignore it anymore. We are talking about the article that pays attention to the fall prevention courses being run in the Netherlands. They are very fascinated by the way these courses are run and we thought this was definitely worth sharing!
The importance of fall prevention
Falling is a common problem in many elderly people. The biggest cause is that the mobility of joints and muscles changes with age. Did you know that even 1 in 3 of elderly people living at home fall at least once a year? Often with unpleasant consequences such as hospitalisation or admission to a care home. What happens next? Because the elderly are afraid of falling, they start avoiding many activities, which also leads to a decline in physical fitness.
To prevent or reduce falls, special fall prevention programmes are established in many physiotherapy practices. These programmes focus mainly on preventing and/or reducing falls.
Fall prevention in The New York Times
'Afraid of falling? For older adults, the Dutch have a cure' is the title of the article highlighting WIJKfysio's fall prevention course from Leusden. During the article, it comes out strongly that fall prevention courses like this one are not only meant to solve the fall problem, but that the social aspect of this course is also very important.
On the fall mats, there is not only focus on falling, but also plenty of time to laugh with each other, make oblique jokes, help each other and talk to each other!
Practice what you can, not what you can't!
In the article, a participant asks the therapist the following question: 'can we learn to stand on one leg?', to which the therapist replies: 'why would you want to learn that?' The participant replies: 'so I can put my trousers back on independently'. The therapist then advises to always sit down while getting dressed and concludes the article with: "You practice the things you know you can do, and not the things you can't."
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someone who is also afraid of falling? Then take contact on with our practice!