Assessing functional outcomes: an overview

Assessment of functional outcomes requires, first, a good working definition and, second, sufficiently reliable and valid measures from which to choose. With the advent of new or refined conceptualizations of patient outcomes, the functional domain has expanded to address not only routine activities of daily life but also the richly diverse aspects believed to constitute quality of life. This article defines and places the concept of functional outcomes within a context of various published and proposed classification schemes, and supports an expanded definition on the basis of these schemes, emerging models of health care that combine biomedical with social science approaches, and the visionary contributions of respected colleagues in the field.