Family Health Assessment

Communicational patterns are strong within the family communicating, interacting, and listening to each other. Mom and Dad have open communication between them and with the children. No dysfunctional communication observed. The decision-making process is between Mom and Dad. The role structure is as equal as can be; Mom works full time and has two part time jobs because Dad is unemployed so Dad has a larger care-giving role. Family values are based upon strong Christian faith. Family attends church every week and children are enrolled in private religious school. Prayer is said before each meal and at bedtime. The family shares a strong religious core with tradition, values, and beliefs.

Family Assessment The family chosen for this assignment are family friends who agreed to conduct the interview and discuss any health issues they had. Because some of the questions were fairly invasive into their private lives, no names are given. There are five members in the family, and they all participated in the interview. Questions are based on the eleven functional health patterns.

Using the CFAM to conduct a family interview, I identified a nursing diagnoses and interventions for the family I interviewed.

Although I enjoy all facets of nursing, I truly believe that it is in the field of family practice that the foundation of the nursing process begins. I have seen many patients over the course of my career without a stable, primary care healthcare provider. Health and wellness begins with day-to-day habits, and a nurse in family care is uniquely poised to give wellness advice and guidance. Family nurse practitioners often perform similar functions to physicians: making diagnoses; prescribing tests and medications; and helping patients over the course of their life trajectories lead more fulfilling lives. Primary caregiving is truly wellness promotion. It involves not simply healing the sick, but also reducing the likelihood that patients will become ill. I have seen so many patients with preventable illnesses that could have

The health of a family is a vital part of how that family interacts with one another and how each individual of the family will function in society, later teaching their children about a healthy lifestyle or lack thereof. The family health assessment helps to identify risk factors and potential dysfunction (Edelman, 2014) I interviewed a single parent family home about their health and how they perceive it. This family is an all-male family, an athletic seventeen year old boy getting ready for his senior year, a twenty year old young man, and a hardworking, dedicated, overweight father.

A family health assessment is a process by which a nurse evaluates and describes the health status of a given family. It is a framework that helps to identify areas of potential risk for illness, opportunities for health education and actions needed to address these (World Health Organization, 2001). Specifics covered in a nurse led family assessment will include family history, perceptions about health, reports, health records, and any clinic test results. The nurse conducts an interview, compiles data and performs an appropriate

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

No major events have occurred in their life since the death of AH’s mom 2 years ago. In the event of any crisis, they depend on the extended family and church members for emotional and morale support. After this family assessment, I felt that the nursing wellness diagnosis (2012) for this family would be:

A comprehensive family assessment provides a foundation to promote family health (Edelman & Mandle, 2011). 1987 Marjorie Gordon purposed 11 functional health patterns to use for guidance in order to facilitate nurses to have a frame work for the family assessment in. Gordon’s 11 functional health patterns help organizes basic family assessment information. This standardized format will guide nurses to complete the family assessment using system approaches, which will identify a patient’s

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

The family has various functions that include teaching members’ values, morals and beliefs as they relate to health practices. Health can be defined as a complete state of wellbeing and not merely the absence of disease. Gordon’s functional health patterns are a methodology developed by Marjorie Gordon in 1987 to be used as a guide to establish a comprehensive nursing database (Kriegler & Harton, 1992). Gordon’s eleven functional health patterns are; health perception/ health

Assessment, the first step in the nursing process, is a concept that must grasped in order for nurses to possess the solid foundation required to develop a plan and provide optimal care to their patients. This assessment is significant not only to individual patients, but their families, who are becoming increasingly recognized for their significance to the health and well being of individual family members. Nurses use a variety of tools in family nursing, and one of the most significant includes the Calgary Family Assessment Model (CFAM), developed by Wright and Leahey. CFAM is an integrated conceptual framework used for interviewing and making

Different assessment examines different features of an individual, or similar assessments examine similar features in different ways. Three assessments that regard family conditions and that are considered important are, the Family Adaptability and Cohesion Evaluation Scales (FACES III), the Family Assessment Device (FAD), and the Self-report Family Inventory (SFI).

The first wellness nursing diagnoses found suitable for the chosen family is readiness for enhanced coping related to increase parental relationship as evidenced by setting positive attitudes toward their children. Secondly, readiness for enhanced nutrition related to verbalization of being healthy without being expensive as evidenced by listing healthy food choices and gathering healthy cooking tips.

Family identification, Two adults one male (30) Father of one child male (3) one female (40) mother of both children male (3) and female (15). Mother works both in and outside the home many hours a week and father is a college student focusing on student pursuits many hours a week. The family adult work and study/class schedule is focused on meeting the immediate needs of the 3 year old child so parents split time and often find themselves spending little time together with one working or studying/attending class while the other is home either working or doing other things some personal pursuits other having to do with housework and upkeep but designed specifically to make sure that the 3 year old is supervised by one or the other parent 90% of the time. After considering the family dynamic and collective list of concerns associated with the family via family interview two areas of special interest to wellness were identified, sleep/rest disturbances and activity/exercise issues. Based on these two areas of special concern the nurse developed two questions associated with Gordon's 11 functional health patterns c) Sleep/Rest and e) Activity/Exercise. Self-report in this area indicates that several members of the family if not all members of the family have overriding issues with sleep/rest cycles.