Whole body vibration therapy to lower the risk of falls in adults

Abstract

Background Information: Falls, making up to approximately one third of admissions to the Accident and Emergency (A&E) Departments in Malta and Gozo, are not being given enough attention, and locally there are currently no falls prevention programmes. Whole body vibration therapy (WBVT) involves a horizontal plate vibrating at a set frequency and amplitude. These vibrations are then transmitted throughout the whole body, inducing muscle contraction and relaxation, exposing the user to passive exercise. The Formulated Research Question: Can WBVT lower the risk of falls in adults over 60 years of age? The PICO Elements: The population studied: males and females over 60 years. The intervention: WBVT with no comparison. The outcome: is to analyze whether WBVT lowers the risk of falls among the studied population. Method: An inclusion/exclusion criterion was established. Only articles published within the past ten years, performed on humans over 60 years, and published in the English language were included. Studies performed on animals or individuals who have suffered/suffer from neural, osteoporotic or muscular conditions, were excluded. A thorough search trail on Medline (ProQuest), Biomed central, SAGE Journals, PubMed, HyDi and EBSCO Host was carried out using the keyterms. Results: A total of 41 possible eligible articles were recovered. After reading the titles and abstracts of all these articles, and comparing them to Evans’ (2003) Hierarchy of Evidence, six articles (four systematic reviews and two randomised controlled trials), were considered as being valid for the search. These were then critically appraised using the Critical Appraisal Skills Programme (2017) tools. Conclusion: After interpreting the results of all papers, it was concluded that three or more weekly sessions of whole body vibration using a high frequency and amplitude, is effective in lowering the risk of falls in older adults. However, this should be further researched and guidelines on the optimal parameters used should be issued. Recommendations for Practice: Recommendations include educating healthcare professionals, those working within the hospital and community settings, about the high incidence of falls and possible treatments like WBVT. Other recommendations include the participation of nurse-led clinics, educating the community about the subject in day centres, leaflets and mass media.