Caregivers Count Too! – Section 3: Introducing Caregiver Assessment Into Your Practice Setting

So you agree that caregivers are vital and vulnerable and that knowing their needs and strengths is important to keep them on the job, but what do you DO about that? How do you introduce caregiver assessment into your practice setting? We’ll walk you through the process with the following scenario noting essential an first step, followed by the five key questions that make up the “nuts & bolts” of caregiver assessment.

First Steps . . . Focus on Your Program

Scenario: Carrie Smith is a Family Caregiver Support Program Specialist at a Michigan Area Agency on Aging. She’s interested in assessing the needs of the caregivers she works with and has heard that some assessment instruments have been developed by others. How should she get started?

Before she chooses—or creates—an instrument, she needs to think about her program and how she will use assessment in it. There is no single “right” way to approach caregiver assessment for all care settings and situations.

Some questions Carrie needs to consider are:

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