Google Street View a quick way to assess fall risk

Embargoed until: Publicly released: 2024-10-18 03:00

New Zealand

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The little orange person on Google Maps can help to quickly assess risk of falls on streets, say NZ researchers. They used Google Street View to look at over 2000 sites where ambulances attended outdoor falls, and answered a series of questions they had designed about the footpaths and roads, generally taking under five minutes per site. They found over 60% of fall sites had at least one trip hazard due to poorly maintained footpaths, although they didn't look at areas where falls didn't occur, so can't link such features with the risk of falling. However, the authors say, community groups and researchers could easily use Google Street View with their series of questions, called the 'Fall-SAFE' tool to audit areas where they are worried about fall risk.

Expert Reaction

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Dr Angela Curl, Senior Lecturer in the Department of Population Health, University of Otago

Falls are a leading cause of injury and accidental death among older adults, but little is known about the pedestrian environment and falls risk.

"We developed a virtual audit tool, Fall-SAFE, designed to assess the street environment from a falls-risk perspective. We then used the tool to describe the street environment characteristics of locations of moderate to severe falls among older adults in Aotearoa New Zealand.

"Fall-SAFE can aid better understanding of the environments in which falls occur and support improvements to infrastructure to reduce pedestrian falls.

Last updated: 11 Oct 2024 10:32am

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Declared conflicts of interest Dr Curl is an author of this study.

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Poor quality footpath 1

Poor quality footpath 5

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Research Population Association of New Zealand, Web page

Journal/
conference: New Zealand Population Review

Organisation/s: University of Otago, University of Auckland, AUT University

Funder: This research was funded through a University of Otago | Te Whare Wānanga o Ōtākou Research Grant.

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