In this short, Dr. Ivan Bracic, DC, clinical director at Novaré Injury Care and Rehab in Fort Myers, explains how muscles that are already too weak and balance that has been slipping for years can set up the fall that breaks a hip. He says preventing a fall is less about being more careful and more about being strong enough that your body can protect itself.
Read the full guide: Balance Exercises for Seniors: 6 Moves to Help Prevent Falls →
Video Transcript
Over 20% of the people who fracture a hip die within a year, and it's not because of the fracture but from what follows: surgery, weeks in bed, muscles wasting away, lungs weakening, pneumonia, blood clots. The body just starts to go.
But here's what nobody talks about: the fall didn't happen randomly. It happened because the muscles were already too weak to catch them.
The balance was already declining, and the fall was just the final event in a process that had been building for years.
Preventing a fall isn't about being more careful. It's truly about being strong enough that your body can protect itself.
Build that strength now, because once the hip goes, everything changes.
Read the full guide on balance exercises that help prevent falls →