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Introduction

Home safety is important to prevent injuries and accidents in older adults living at home. Feeling safe at home is also essential for frail older adults’ well-being. "Ageing in place" is a term focusing on enabling older adults to stay in their ordinary homes, rather than in special housing. But when older adults continue living at home, more injuries and accidents can occur. The aim of this study was to explore older adults’ experiences, preventive measures, and feelings of safety in their home in relation to a range of potential home-based health and safety hazards.

Methods and Materials

The study had a cross-sectional design and was based on a national telephone survey among 400 adults over 70 years of age, living at home in ordinary housing in Sweden. Descriptive and comparative statistics were used to analyse the data.

Results

The participants rated the importance of feeling safe at home as high, and seldom felt unsafe. Higher age, greater frequency of feeling unsafe at home or in the neighbourhood, access to support, better health, importance of safety and living alone were associated with level of worry or for having taken preventive measures against some but not all hazards in the home.

Conclusions

Taking preventive measures is not always is not always associated with experiences or level of worry. Age, feelings of safety, access to support, health and living alone or not, are all factors that can influence level of worry or for taking preventive measures or not against specific hazards in the home.