NURSING ASSIGNMENT NRSG139: Health Assessment Interview Report

This nursing assignment presents a detailed health assessment report based on an interview with a 73-year-old female patient named Amelia Smith. The report covers various aspects of her health, including demographics, family profile, and current health status. The assessment is structured around categories such as maintaining a safe environment, breathing, eating and drinking, mobilising, and sleeping. The patient's responses reveal actual problems like respiratory infections, COPD, eyesight impairment, digestion issues, and knee pain, as well as potential problems such as the unavailability of oxygen therapy and stress. The report also includes a discussion on healthy aging, factors that facilitate and hinder it, and recommendations for improving the patient's health and well-being, concluding with a reflection on the interview process and new learnings. The assignment also references relevant literature to support the findings and recommendations, including the importance of healthy eating, exercise, and mental well-being for older adults.

Running head: NURSING ASSIGNMENT
Nursing assignment
Name of the Student:
Name of the University:
Author Note:

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Nrsg139 Assessment Task 2 – Health Assessment Interview
Demographics:
Name- Amelia Smith
Age- 73 years
Date of Birth- 11- JAN-1945
Sex- Female
Religion- Christianity
Marital status- Married
Educational level- Under Graduate
Family profile:
Husband, Children= Two (one daughter, one son)
Heath Status- Husband suffering from cardiovascular disease, Children are healthy.
Living arrangements- Lives in a private dwelling
Category 1- Maintaining a safe environment:
Q1. Do you have any risks regarding infection, shock, haemorrhage or unconsciousness?
A- There are few instances of unconsciousness and I am suffering from respiratory tract
infection.
Q2. Do you feel some medication related problem?
Answer- No
Q3- Are you able to prevent yourself from accidents or injuries?

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A- I seldom fell down from my bed due to my eyesight problem during night.
Q4- Do you have any knowledge about the methods required to promote healthy living?
A- No
Q5- Are you anxious about leading healthy lifestyle?
A- Yes, I want to lead a safe lifestyle.
Q6- Do you require any information about healthy living?
A- Yes
Q7- Do you find any risky situations within environment?
A- Environmental pollution is the biggest risk and it effects my health a lot. All industrial
harmful chemicals increase my respiratory infection.
Q8- Are you facing any socio economic challenges in achieving a healthy life style?
A- Yes, recently food taxes increased abruptly that is hindering me to maintain a healthy
balanced diet.
Category 2 – Breathing:
Q1- Do you feel any difficulty while breathing?
A- Yes, I am suffering from Chronic Obstructive Pulmonary Disease (COPD)
Q2- What activities are being hindered during breathing problem?
A- I cannot walk, dress and wash my cloths properly as I feel shortness of breath.
Q3- Have you got any emotional shock that affect your breathing?
A- No.

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Q4- Do you need any additional information to decrease your breathing difficulties?
A- Yes
Q5- Do you have any sociocultural beliefs regarding breathing difficulty?
A- No
Q6- Is the room on which you are living has sufficient air and oxygen supply?
A-Not sufficient.
Q7- Do you have enough resources to avail oxygen therapy facilities in home?
A- Yes.
Category 3- Eating and drinking
Q1- Are you able to cook any nutritious diet by yourself?
A- No, I am dependent on home deliveries.
Q2- Do you have any digestion issues?
A- Yes, I feel difficulty in chewing and swallowing of food. This sometimes cause problem
in digesting foods.
Q3- What is your height and current weight?
A- Height is 5’8” and weight is 90 Kgs
Q4- Do you have any knowledge about healthy diet?
A- Little knowledge.
Q5- What kind of environment do you prefer during taking meals?
A- Clear and hygienic environment.

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Category 4- Mobilising
Q1—Do you able to walk without a stick or any chair?
A- Yes, but not steadily.
Q2- Are you normally active?
A- No
Q3- What are the factors that affect your mobilisation?
A- I have pain in knee joints.
Category 5- Sleeping
Q1- What is your sleeping and awakening time in your daily routine?
A- I sleep at 10 pm and wake up at 6 am.
Q2- Do you take any medication to aid sleep?
A- Yes.
Q3- What are the reasons for you sleep deficit?
A- Stress.

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SUMMATION OF KEY HABITS, ROUTINES, ACTUAL PROBLEMS AND
POTENTIAL PROBLEMS.
Normal habits and routines Actual and Potential problems
Maintaining a safe environment Actual problem identified are her eyesight impairment,
seldom unconsciousness and respiratory infections.
Amongst them the potential problem is her eyesight
impairment.
Breathing She said that her actual problem is she is a patient of
COPD She needs some oxygen therapy facilities.
Potential problem thus identified is the unavailability of
this facility in her room. For a COPD patient, it is
mandatory to arrange oxygen therapy facilities to give
them relief during severe breathing problem
Eating and drinking Actual problems identified are improper digestion and
overweight. She also lacks knowledge about healthy diet.
Potential problem is her digestion issue. She is an aged
woman and is still dependent on home delivery services
for food. Gastrointestinal problems arise due to
ingestion of those spicy foods (Camilleri & Brako, 2017).
Mobilising Actual problem mentioned by her includes eyesight
impairment and pain in knee joints. These impair her
mobility and normal activities. Potential problem

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identified is her pain in knee joints that hinders her from
mobilising.
Sleeping She mentioned that she lacks sleeping due to her
breathing problem. Moreover, her anxiety and stress are
also a reason. Potential problem is thus her anxiety that
mainly hampers her sleep.
Conclusion drawn from interview:
From the above interview, it can be concluded that the interviewee is suffering from
some ageing problems. She is having COPD which is a respiratory disorder and some
eyesight impairment. These are hampering her from preforming normal physical activities.
Moreover, she needs some oxygen therapy facilities and an assistant to help her during
household activities.
Introduction:
The process of emerging and sustaining the functional abilities that enables the
betterment of health in older age is termed as healthy ageing (Bousquet et al., 2015). This
essay presents an interview of a woman who is above 50 years and also highlights her actual
and potential problems. Lastly, this will provide some effective measures that should an
individual practice for achieving a healthy ageing.
CRC 1 – Considering the patient situation
Interview was conducted on a health clinic where outdoor patients were present along
with some physicians. Interviewee was called at sharp 10 am and it was started at 10.10 am.

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Interview set up was good and the surrounding was calm and quite. This helped everyone to
concentrate on the interview. Data was collected manually as well as electronically.
Computerized data entry was also done for correct evaluation of data.
CRC 2 – Collect cues and information
Interviewing an aged person always seems to be a challenging event. In this case it
was a different experience. She was really very much cooperating and kept enough patience
throughout the interview process. She gave every answer very accurately and did not hide
any informations from us. She wanted to avail some health facilities and that will be provided
by health care as soon as possible. Health clinic provided a written consent to the patient for
information gathering and clarifying techniques.
CRC 3 – Process information
Factors that facilitate healthy aging includes the engagement of the older people for
promoting good health and wellbeing. They should eat healthy foods and maintain a balanced
diet. They have to do some general exercises for muscle strength, balance and flexibility
(McPhee et al., 2016).
There are many barriers to healthy ageing. With increase of age, organs dysfunction
occur that results in onset of many diseases (Van Deursen, 2014). Another important barrier
of healthy ageing is loneliness. Aged people are more likely to feel lonelier and become less
enthusiastic to fight against their diseases (van den Berg et al., 2016).
CRC 8 – Reflect on process and new learning
Older people need to undergo some new learning processes that will help them to
achieve healthy ageing. Most importantly, they have to speak to a doctor about nutritional
needs and should need to follow this. Health professionals should review their medication

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regularly. Meditation should be done regularly for getting adequate sound sleep (Black et al.,
2015). Older people should spend time with family and friends and should lead an engaged
life.
Conclusion
This can be deduced from the above discussion that a though ageing is a natural
procedure of human life, yet healthy ageing can be achieved only when an aged people lead a
healthy life. This essay included an interview that gave an idea about some actual and
potential problem of an old woman. Lastly, it highlighted some new learnings that they
should follow for the betterment of health.

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Reference List
Black, D. S., O’Reilly, G. A., Olmstead, R., Breen, E. C., & Irwin, M. R. (2015).
Mindfulness meditation and improvement in sleep quality and daytime impairment
among older adults with sleep disturbances: a randomized clinical trial. JAMA
internal medicine, 175(4), 494-501. Retrieved from:
https://jamanetwork.com/journals/jamainternalmedicine/fullarticle/2110998
Bousquet, J., Kuh, D., Bewick, M., Standberg, T., Farrell, J., Pengelly, R., ... & Camuzat, T.
(2015). Operational definition of active and healthy ageing (AHA): a conceptual
framework. The journal of nutrition, health & aging, 19(9), 955-960. Retrieved from:
https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007%2Fs12603-015-0589-6
Camilleri, M., & Brako, A. N. (2017). Role of Nutrition in Understanding Common
Gastrointestinal Disorders. In Nutrition Guide for Physicians and Related Healthcare
Professionals (pp. 129-138). Humana Press, Cham. Retrieved from :
https://link.springer.com/chapter/10.1007%2F978-3-319-49929-1_13
McPhee, J. S., French, D. P., Jackson, D., Nazroo, J., Pendleton, N., & Degens, H. (2016).
Physical activity in older age: perspectives for healthy ageing and frailty.
Biogerontology, 17(3), 567-580. Retrieved from:
https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007%2Fs10522-016-9641-0
van den Berg, P., Kemperman, A., de Kleijn, B., & Borgers, A. (2016). Ageing and
loneliness: the role of mobility and the built environment. Travel Behaviour and
Society, 5, 48-55. Retrieved from: https://doi.org/10.1016/j.tbs.2015.03.001
Van Deursen, J. M. (2014). The role of senescent cells in ageing. Nature, 509(7501), 439.
Retrieved from: https://www.nature.com/articles/nature13193