STAND. COM. REP. NO. 360

 

Honolulu, Hawaii

                  

 

RE:    S.B. No. 105

       S.D. 1

 

 

 

Honorable Donna Mercado Kim

President of the Senate

Twenty-Seventh State Legislature

Regular Session of 2013

State of Hawaii

 

Madam:

 

     Your Committees on Health and Human Services, to which was referred S.B. No. 105 entitled:

 

"A BILL FOR AN ACT RELATING TO HEALTH,"

 

beg leave to report as follows:

 

     The purpose and intent of this measure is to prevent injury to the elderly through the establishment of a statewide fall prevention and early detection program to detect and reduce falls among the elderly.

 

     Your Committees received testimony in support of this measure from the Department of Health; Maui County Office on Aging; Stay at Home Modifications, LLC; and one individual.

 

     Your Committees find that in 2011, there were 5,719 emergency room visits and 1,868 hospitalizations for falls by the elderly in Hawaii.  It is estimated that over thirty percent of the elderly fall annually.  As the number of elderly increases, it is anticipated that the number of fall-related injuries by the elderly requiring hospital treatment will increase by approximately three percent annually.  Your Committees find that the establishment of a statewide fall prevention and early detection program will greatly aid in reducing falls by the elderly.

 

     Your Committees have amended this measure by:

 

     (1)  Making the establishment of the statewide fall prevention and early detection program by the Department of Health mandatory rather than discretionary; and

 

     (2)  Making technical, nonsubstantive amendments for the purposes of clarity and consistency.

 

     As affirmed by the records of votes of the members of your Committees on Health and Human Services that are attached to this report, your Committees are in accord with the intent and purpose of S.B. No. 105, as amended herein, and recommend that it pass Second Reading in the form attached hereto as S.B. No. 105, S.D. 1, and be referred to the Committee on Ways and Means.

 

Respectfully submitted on behalf of the members of the Committees on Health and Human Services,

 

____________________________

SUZANNE CHUN OAKLAND, Chair

 

____________________________

JOSH GREEN, Chair