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Call for papers - Falls, Fractures and Orthogeriatrics

Guest Editors:
Daniela Cristina Carvalho de Abreu: University of São Paulo, Brazil
Carmelinda Ruggiero: University of Perugia, Italy

Submission Status: Open   |   Submission Deadline: 30 June 2023


BMC Geriatrics is calling for submissions to our Collection on Falls, Fractures and Orthogeriatrics. Addressing falls and fragility fractures in older adults is still necessary since they are associated with a long-term burden of disability and costs worldwide, i.e., increasing hospitalizations, post-hospital syndromes, mobility-disability, post-fall syndromes, and poor quality of life. However, we still need to discuss innovative methodologies and effective approaches to optimize the case finding, the decision-making and achieve patients’ goals and quality of life.

Meet the Guest Editors

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Daniela Cristina Carvalho de Abreu: University of São Paulo, Brazil

Daniela Cristina Carvalho de Abreu is Associate Professor of Physiotherapy, Ribeirao Preto Medical School of the University of São Paulo (FMRP/USP), Brazil. Coordinator of Laboratory of Assessment and Rehabilitation of Equilibrium (LARE). Coordinator of Balance Outpatient and the Physiotherapy Outpatient for cancer survivors, both at Clinical Hospital (FMRP-USP). Member of Core Research in Functional Performance and Rehabilitation in Chronic Degenerative Diseases (NAP-DCD), FMRP-USP. Tutor of the Gerontology Physiotherapy League at FMRP-USP and a member of the  Rehabilitation Committee of the Fragility Fracture Network-Brazil. Her research group is focused on the evaluation, prevention, and intervention of chronic degenerative diseases and focus on balance and functionality changes related to the aging process, with emphasis on solutions that may be applied to and incorporated into the care of patients with chronic non-transmissible diseases in the older population.

Carmelinda Ruggiero: University of Perugia, Italy
Carmelinda Ruggiero is Professor of Gerontology and Geriatrics at the department of Medicine and Surgery, University of Perugia, Italy. She is also Head of the Orthogeriatric Unit of the Academic Hospital of Perugia, Italy and President of the Fragility Fracture Network-Italy. She is extremely interested in frailty and age-related conditions, including osteoporosis, falls and fragility fractures, dementia, inappropriate drug prescription and orthogeriatrics. 

About the collection

BMC Geriatrics is calling for submissions to our Collection on Falls, Fractures and Orthogeriatrics.

Addressing falls and fragility fractures in older adults is still necessary since they are associated with a long-term burden of disability and costs worldwide, i.e., increasing hospitalizations, post-hospital syndromes, mobility-disability, post-fall syndromes, and poor quality of life. However, we still need to discuss innovative methodologies and effective approaches to optimize the case finding, the decision-making and achieve patients’ goals and quality of life.

This is the time for a call to action that prioritizes the complexity of falls and fragility fracture management, building opportunities to include in the center of the discussion the orthogeriatric care model and the comprehensive interdisciplinary approach.

It is particularly important to discuss the patients’ risk stratification (i.e., fit, frail, disabled, or demented subjects) in the orthogeriatric care and rehabilitation programs, and the optimal outcomes obtained through an interdisciplinary healthcare program. Increasing interest regards procedures, structural and organizational aspects that may be associated with better outcomes (i.e. type of ward, professionals, protocols and procedures, minimum competencies, etc). In addition, more evidence about the efficacy and the sustainability of interventions for secondary prevention of falls and fragility fractures are required. Ultimately, there is a need to highlight the best pathway of care, related protocols and effects on main outcomes, which is the key component to support changes in the clinical practice and organization.

Intervention programs taking into account falls, fractures, and frailty are rising as the ICOPE, proposed by WHO, or the Fracture Liaison Services supported by IOF, and evidence from additional programs are welcome. Many methodological analytical flaws, lack of consensus about interventions, and actual constraints in the implementation of such programs have been argumented, therefore an updated summary of such issues is desidered within this collection. Aspects related with the clinical fisibility of available programs, their added value and the patients’ satisfaction, may also benefit all stakeholders.

With this collection at BMC Geriatrics, we are interested in attracting a wide range of submissions with a focus on the interplay of falls, fragility fractures, and orthogeriatrics. We strongly believe that fall and fragility fracture prevention is a critical milestone in the achievement of quality human longevity, and the interdisciplinary view may help to achieve better outcomes.


We are interested in evidences that highlight:

  • The healthcare and the economic burden associated with falls and fragility fractures, worldwide; 
  • The importance of recognizing frailty as a condition associated or  underlying falls and fragility fractures and the need for comprehensive appropriate assessment and interdisciplinary management of people living with falls and fragility fractures; 
  • The patients’ and systems’ gains associated with the orthogeriatric care management and interdisciplinary models of care after fragility fractures, from hospital admission to rehabilitation program outcomes (short and long-term); 
  • The increasing burden of peri-prosthesis fractures secondary to falls and the issues associated with surgical, rehabilitation and recovery of quality of life; 
  • The reasons for unsatisfaction or unfitness of available fall and fracture prevention programs in reaching desired goals;
  • The opportunity and the impact of innovative fall and fracture program for secondary prevention to overcome the schism between “bench and bedside” evidence.

  1. Postal screening has not previously been validated as a method for identifying fall and fracture risk in community-dwelling populations. We examined prognostic performance of a postal risk screener used in the...

    Authors: Julie Bruce, Anower Hossain, Chen Ji, Ranjit Lall, Susanne Arnold, Emma Padfield, Martin Underwood and Sarah E. Lamb
    Citation: BMC Geriatrics 2023 23:42
    Content type: Research Published on:

  2. Nutritional status, which is associated with osteoporosis and muscle weakness is considered an important factor in the management of acute osteoporotic vertebral fracture (AOVF). However, few reports have inve...

    Authors: Tetsuto Yamaura, Fumihiro Arizumi, Keishi Maruo, Kazuya Kishima, Norichika Yoshie, Tomoyuki Kusukawa, Fumiaki Imamura and Toshiya Tachibana
    Citation: BMC Geriatrics 2022 22:1002
    Content type: Research Published on:

  3. Fracture risk assessment is still far from perfect within the geriatric population. The overall aim of this study is to better identify older women at risk for fractures, using a quantitative measure of frailt...

    Authors: Patrik Bartosch and Linnea Malmgren
    Citation: BMC Geriatrics 2022 22:951
    Content type: Research Published on:

Submission Guidelines

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This Collection welcomes submission of Research Articles. Before submitting your manuscript, please ensure you have read our submission guidelines. Articles for this Collection should be submitted via our submission system, Snapp. During the submission process you will be asked whether you are submitting to a Collection, please select "Falls, Fractures and Orthogeriatrics" from the dropdown menu.

Articles will undergo the journal’s standard peer-review process and are subject to all of the journal’s standard policies. Articles will be added to the Collection as they are published.

The Guest Editors have no competing interests with the submissions which they handle through the peer review process. The peer review of any submissions for which the Guest Editors have competing interests is handled by another Editorial Board Member who has no competing interests.