Family Assessment Questions

Nurses often use the aspect of time as an excuse not to conduct a family interview, however, Wright and Leahey (2009) clearly demonstrate how integrating families into patient care does not have to consume a lot of time. Using the Calgary Family Assessment Model (CFAM) and Calgary Family Intervention Model (CFIM), a family interview can be organized and conducted in a less amount of time, and end in a greater understanding of the patient and family. The CFAM contains three major categories including structural, developmental, and functional, which can be used to assess a family or help them address a specific health issue (Wright & Leahey, 2009). The CFIM uses assessments focusing on strengths, meaning that it uses the strengths of each individual family member, and the unit as a whole to provide positive interventions. This allows the interventions to focus on encouraging the family, rather than their deficits or dysfunctions (Wright and Leahey, 2009). During the 15-minute interview, it is suggested to have the entire family present so that the interviewer is able note reactions and collaborate with each family member, thus providing the most acceptable plan of care for the entire family.

It also shows that not every family has the same strengths and how the every family’s strengths can differ from each other’s. Which allows the nurse to use this tool to identify their strengths as a family to help them to set a family goal to achieve together and formulate a problem solving plan. It’s an easy tool because the questions are straightforward and it is a child friendly tool, suitable for any age not just the adults. It is a family assessment therefore the children’s feelings shall not be neglected. External family members can take part in this assessment as well, not only will it improve the family members’ relationship with each other and as a family but also help build a trusting relationship with the nurse which will allow the family members to voice out or share anything without feeling uncomfortable. (Smith LM

The family assessment is a thorough assessment done by a health care provider. This assessment is the foundation of how health care providers deliver care for a certain member of the family or the family as a whole. This assessment involves exploration of the family structure, development, and function. In addition, the family will express their strengths and barriers, internal and external structure, ethnicity, social class, religion, and subsystems, which will allow the reader a better understanding of the family’s functioning.

What chronic diseases do you see most often in your patients? What is the prevalence rate for the chronic disease you have identified in your practice? What illness behaviors do you see in your patients? Is this typical behavior according to your text? How do their family members react?

Family health assessment is an integral part of the formula used in creating a customized plan of care for the families’ health care. Family health assessment is also a tool that can be used to identify and evaluate the family’s health concerns, their life style and also helping families make good decisions regarding their family’s health. Family’s perception towards health and health promotion could be very different and unique, which makes the Family health assessment even more challenging for the nurses and health care professionals. Nurse’s have a moral obligation towards the society to help them promote their families health. The

As the society we live in continues to transform, nurses need a comprehensive tool to assess family’s health patterns. Family units are influenced by environment, biological, mental, social and spiritual factors. Assessing these areas for health promotion and disease prevention will take all of these influences into consideration (Edelman & Mandle, 2010). A priority to a family focused health assessment approach is to adequately question, assess and examine these areas. A tool to assist a family health assessment using a family focused approach is Gordon’s 11 Functional Patterns. This paper will use these 11

1. Describe each of your close family members: parents, aunts and uncles, grandparents, and brothers and sisters. What do each of them look like? What health concerns do they have?

When a particular family member thinks about health its not just a thought but a action to take control of how that behavior will encourage the best health they can possibly obtain. A family is considered a complex unit made up of many dimensions within that unit. By this being said all family members may have acquired a illness, disease, or passed a inherit gene on but is well in all other parts of their health. A disease is an illness that will affect the family as a whole, this illness could be very taxing on the family as a unit, this illness or disease could present itself as either a acute or chronic presentation. The manner in which the illness progresses will determine the taxing effect on the

The individuals that were interviewed were able to follow simple directions and recall information that was asked at the beginning of the interview. The family members senses appeared to be intact, with one common characteristic of them all wearing glasses. An visual assessment was made of each family member and questions about sexuality and familial roles was asked of the father. When asked questions about the father sexuality the father stated that he had four lovely daughter and was a widower after thirty-seven years of marriage and did not think it was appropriate to speak about his sexuality or sexual relationships. The gentleman of the house, relationship role had recently changed from being a provider to now being a caretaker, homemaker and the sole provider, after the passing of his wife. He mentioned that he doesn’t mind the role change because he would do anything for his family. The widower stated that since the passing of his wife he

More familial involvement in disease management is associated with healthier family functioning (Gavin & Wysocki, 2005). The context in which assessment takes place includes not only specific characteristics of the illness, but also a patient’s individual traits and daily activities (Corbin, 1991). Before, during, and after the clinic visit, it is the responsibility of the PNP to recognize traits in JD such as his age, race, gender, hobbies, and personality characteristics that may help in the diagnosis and management of the projected condition.

A family is a very unique social group and they come in all kinds of shapes, sizes, colors, and configurations. Families are unique in the sense that they are one of the only social groupings that despite hardships and falling outs, always manage to stick together and support one another when it is needed the most. The health of each family member is extremely important to the cohesiveness of the unit as a whole, and a family assessment can be a useful tool for an evaluation of the overall health of the group. In looking at the assessment of my family’s health, we are going to look at hypertension, cancer, risk factors, protective factors, and an applied nursing model.

To conclude we are to review family, social, sexual, occupational histories and perform a systemic enquiry. Family history usually pertains to immediate family as in mother, father and siblings. Some conditions are genetically predisposed such as diabetes and heart

I conducted my Family Health Evaluation on the Robert family, a good example of a typical family that consists of a father, mother, and children. The Robert family consists of a 40-year-old father, 37-year-old mother, and four children aged 20, 18, 16 and 14. The Robert family has their own set of beliefs and values just like every family should, but they also have some bad health behaviors and attitudes which can cause them problems in the future. After assessing and evaluating the Robert family, I found out that the family members care and love each other very much. The only problem is that this family does not seek medical attention if they are sick unless they are in severe condition, or it is an emergency. They do keep up with their primary healthcare provider from time to time, which is obviously a good thing.

The family is a concept in the society that acts as the basic unit of socialization. Family means a social group that is made of individuals who depend on one another for emotional and financial support. The dynamic state of family health and well-being is a great deal since it can affect the functioning of the entire family. All families, however, deal with stress at one point. Each family reacts to stress differently, but the main effects include poor communication among the family members, exhaustion from busy schedules, over-dependence, resource constraints and confusion especially among the children. As a result of this potential family stress, family nursing is considered essential to ensure identification of health problems, risk factors and interventions to address the health concerns adequately (Boss, 1980). Family nursing is a part of the primary care available for all patients across all ages, from infant to geriatric. Approaches to family nursing include the environment they exist, family structure, recourses available and family values.

A family health assessment is a significant instrument in conveying a health care plan for a family. This paper will discuss the nurse’s role in family assessment and how this task is performed. By the use of family focused open ended questions, 11 functional health patterns were covered. The health patterns were values and health perception, nutrition, sleep and rest, elimination, activities and exercise, cognitive, sensory-perception, self-perception, role relationship, sexuality, and coping. This principle is known as the Gordon’s functional health patterns. Family health assessment defines the assessment of actual and potential problems of individuals (Gordon, 1994). This assessment tool included 11 systematic principles for data collection of the family, and assists the nurses to develop a nursing diagnosis and appropriate interventions. Using Gordon’s functional health patterns, this paper will summarize the findings of each health pattern as well as the family based nursing diagnosis of each assessment. This paper will also discuss different health promotion strategies along with web-based resources, also including a system based theory guide in family assessment.