As the elder care service industry expands and diversifies, more professionals become involved as care managers or as court-appointed guardians or conservators to address the various needs of elderly clients.
If you tend to the personal, financial, and/or safety affairs of elderly individuals, you often find yourself reflecting on your clients’ abilities to function adequately on a day-to-day basis.
In your professional role, you may be concerned about a particular area of functioning, such as self-care, personal safety, ability to manage finances without being exploited, adequate nutrition, or ability to consistently take medications that physicians have prescribed.
Perhaps you also encounter clients who protest their family members’ push for assisted living or placement in an elder care facility. You might also be contacted by family members, friends, or caretakers who are concerned about these issues in regard to a loved one with whom you are working.
In addition, particularly as a guardian or conservator, you may be asked to render an opinion about the functional ability or competence of one of your clients in the context of a legal proceeding.
With the ever increasing demands of a busy professional life, you may find that you have neither the time nor the means to fully address these issues despite your recognition of their importance and your intention to provide the highest quality of care to your clients.
If you feel conflicted, you are not alone in struggling with the conclusion that you cannot realistically provide the kind of assessment that is required, despite your best intentions. However, when you come to the decision that a formal evaluation of functional ability may be the best course of action, then you are faced with the challenge of finding a qualified specialist, such as a psychologist, to whom you can confidently refer your clients.
Sound familiar?
How We Can Help You…
At The Center for Forensic & Clinical Psychology, our highly qualified staff of psychologists and clinical associates can relieve this challenging aspect of your practice and welcome the opportunity to do so. We recognize that your priority is to provide the very best supervision and care to your clients.
Consequently, our commitment is to support you in that effort by providing expert consultation and evaluation. A unique aspect of our services is that we specialize in evaluations that are customized to your client’s specific needs.
Our psychology staff is knowledgeable of both the medical and psychological aspects of aging, as well as the legal issues involved in evaluating functional capacity.
We have constructed an approach to evaluation that complies with statutory requirements and which is based upon a variety of strategies that may include:
- Clinical interviews
- Collateral interviews
- Review of medical records
- Diagnostic assessment
- Behavioral observation
- State-of-the-art standardized psychological tests of demonstrated validity
The evaluation process concludes with a written report of the results and any pertinent recommendations.
The report is specifically designed to be useful to you, with regard to the optimal ways of providing care to your elderly clients. Because our evaluation procedures comply with statutory requirements, the report is useful in legal proceedings as well.
Our Evaluation Process…
Although referrals for evaluation are typically made in response to concerns associated with aging, psychological evaluation of functional ability can also be quite helpful when concerns arise from disability, catastrophic illness, or injury.
The emphasis of the evaluation is to provide a clear picture of an individual’s functioning in his or her present environment, taking situational demands into account. Strengths and limitations in areas of function are addressed, as well as any environmental factors that may be contributing to dysfunction, possible assistive or rehabilitative strategies that may improve function or ability to live as independently as possible, and consideration of alternative living arrangements if applicable.
While evaluation often includes a screening assessment of neurocognitive functioning, the evaluation of functional ability, or competence, is distinct from a full neuropsychological testing battery, with which you may already be familiar. In our opinion, the evaluation of functional abilities relevant to an individual’s specific current environment and specific life demands provides a more valid basis for treatment planning.
We place great emphasis on performing evaluations of functional ability within a framework that respects and addresses the client’s personal integrity, values, and individual perspective on his or her needs.
We place a high priority on appointment availability, an affordable fee schedule, responsiveness to time constraints, and flexibility in accommodating circumstances that require travel or court appearance.
Call us today at 303-837-0776 to arrange a free 30-minute consultation.
