Physical Assessment of School-Aged Children

Running head: PHYSICAL ASSESSMENT OF SCHOOL-AGED CHILDREN
PHYSICAL ASSESSMENT OF SCHOOL-AGED CHILDREN
Name of the Student
Name of the University
Author note

1PHYSICAL ASSESSMENT OF SCHOOL-AGED CHILDREN
Developmental stages of children and the prognosis of these helps the family members,
healthcare physicians and other stakeholders of the society to understand the need of each child
and their altered requirements (Schmidt et al., 2015). While conducting on physical assessment,
healthcare professionals generally conduct nutritional assessment, immunization, current
medication and health history and physiological history (Urke et al., 2018). However, these
factors completely depend on the age or developmental stage of the child and depending on that
the flow of assessment is decided (Woodhead, 2016). While assessing infants, pediatric nurses
assess their respiration rate, heart rate, blood pressure and temperature respectively, with
developing age and cognitive abilities, their speech, communication, ability to walk to move and
their cognitive and motor skills are assessed (Marley, Rizzo & Swisher, 2016). Therefore, for the
physical assessment of school aged children (5 to 12 years), these aspects will be modified and
depending on that with vital signs of the child, his/her cognitive abilities, physical and mental
assessment will be carried out.
Thesis statement: this paper will conduct physical assessment of Alexander Smith (9) to
understand his developmental stages and associated needs and then will utilize strategies to
address them.
Alexander smith (9) has been selected for the physical assessment and the primary aim of
this assessment is to understand his needs depending on the developmental stage. As per his age,
he is under the school-based developmental stage and by this age, he is determined to develop
fine motor skills, sexual characteristics, communication with peers and ability to become socially
aware, and these are the abilities which are obtained through the previous pre-school
developmental stage (Schmidt et al., 2015). Besides these, there are abilities such as enhanced
speech, enhanced understanding of speed, time and distance, which has been acquired by the