While a patient is in the hospital, that institution is responsible for his or her well-being. Patient falls are detrimental to patient safety and frequently represent the largest category of incident reports submitted to risk management. Thus, hospitals today are strongly motivated to reduce patient falls because quality care is of utmost importance to both the patient and the institution. However, today's climate of cost containment and litigious actions provides additional incentives for assuring quality of care by preventing patient falls.