Functional status assessment for community long-term care: preliminary observations

Area of Science:

• Gerontology
• Rehabilitation Science
• Health Services Research

Background:

• The South Carolina Community Long-Term Care (CLTC) program assists nursing home-eligible individuals in remaining at home.
• Inconsistent eligibility determinations arise from variations in client evaluation methods within the CLTC program.

Purpose of the Study:

• To develop and validate a simple, objective assessment tool to enhance the consistency of CLTC program eligibility evaluations.
• To test a conceptual framework based on Nagi's model of disablement in older adults.

Main Methods:

• Development of a straightforward, objective assessment tool.
• Testing the tool on community-dwelling healthy older adults and CLTC clients.
• Utilizing a conceptual framework based on Nagi's model of disablement.

Main Results:

• Three simple physiologic tasks (mobility, leg strength, manual dexterity) were used for assessment.
• The assessment tool accurately discriminated between healthy older adults and CLTC clients.
• Classification accuracy ranged from 80% to 90%.

Conclusions:

• The developed objective assessment tool can reliably complement CLTC evaluations.
• This tool offers a more consistent method for determining eligibility for home-based long-term care services.
• The findings support the use of objective physiologic measures in assessing disablement for long-term care services.