Functional assessment: a holistic approach to rehabilitation of the geriatric client

Functional assessment of the elderly client provides a structured approach to the complex and multidimensional issues in rehabilitation. Rehabilitation nurses may be familiar with some of the long-standing functional assessment tools, such as Barthel's index. It is important to have a working knowledge of a variety of tools, as well as an ongoing awareness of newer ones as they are developed (e.g., the Functional Independence Measure). Functional assessment is part of comprehensive geriatric evaluation. After initial assessment by rehabilitation team members, the team considers the patient's strengths and supports and develops a problem list (NIH, 1987). The individualized plan of care is developed with the elderly client to achieve maximum rehabilitation potential. Functional assessment tools assist in measuring rehabilitation progress and in clinical decision making. They also can be used in clinical research in geriatric rehabilitation. The number of elderly persons in this country is growing rapidly. Rehabilitation nurses will need to expand their clinical skills to integrate holistic geriatric assessment.