A family assessment tool for hospitalized elders

This article describes the development of the FAMILY card, a family assessment instrument used in the Nursing Care Quality Initiative (NCQI) to assess the involvement and needs of family members of hospitalized elders. Through the NCQI project, particular attention has been paid to integrating both clinical expertise in geriatric nursing care and the principles of family-centered care into the nursing care provided by staff on the NCQI study units. Two case studies illustrating use of the SPICES geriatric assessment instrument and the newly developed FAMILY assessment card are included as exemplars.