The latest research aimed at helping seniors avoid falling involves intentionally tripping them.

The purpose of the research is to prevent falls by teaching seniors, implicitly, how to recover from stumbles and tripping. It involves a customized treadmill that allows seniors to walk at a comfortable pace until the computerized walkway stops or starts suddenly, causing the person to stumble.

Each person who walks on the treadmill is hooked up to several electrodes that monitor range of movement, as well as a harness that prevents injury from the induced falls.

For the elderly, falling is one of the biggest causes of injury, costing billions of dollars in treatment each year. Complications from the injuries, such as blood clots and depression, are also very real threats to seniors after a fall.

Leading the research efforts is Clive Pai. He calls his approach to fall prevention a “vaccine against falls.”

Unlike traditional approaches aimed at avoiding falls in elderly populations, Pai’s technique does not require a long string of sessions to be effective. Historically, physical therapies that improve balance and build strength over several weeks have been relied on. Pai says that his method allows for implicit, or subconscious, learning. Directions are not given to the participants, they either recover from the trip or fall and are caught by the harness.

But his approach seems to be working. His research has shown that participants were 50 percent less likely to fall after just one session on his walkway, and they were able to maintain this reduced risk for a year.

When speaking of participation and the lack of instruction, Pai said, “They don’t have to be motivated — they’re naturally motivated because they don’t want to be on the floor.”

The method is still several years away from being introduced into general clinical practice. Pai is currently working with a five year grant that he will use to further develop the treadmill as well as recruit 300 more participants for the study. His results have been called promising by experts from the National Institute of Aging and he hopes to someday have treadmills incorporated into doctors’ offices around the country.