A story from PH Consulting
On July 2 R.B., a 90+ year old female, walked her routine test and scored 52. That was thirteen points under the walking norm for her age. Nothing in her chart explained it. She said she felt fine and no fall had been reported.
A drop like that has two readings. Something happened, or the number is noise. With a resident in her nineties decline is what might be expected. But waiting and seeing if anything happens costs days, and days matter when something is actually wrong.
The score was read against her own record rather than against a threshold. Twenty-one points below where she had been holding is not noise. OneStep put that gap in front of her team, and the team treated it as a finding. It triggered review and imaging instead of a wait-and-see. The fall behind it was mentioned days later.
Therapy worked her back toward the score she had held before July. By August 7 she was at 73, her best of the year. She has been above the norm for her age on every walk since July 31. Her longest walk of the period, 93 seconds, came last rather than first. Her fall risk is back to Low.
A bedside check would have found a woman who felt fine. The walk found a 21-point gap.
Key Outcomes