Assessment Tool Analysis

Assessment tools are applied to investigate, and assist in intercession with a patient’s physical, emotional, and mental well-being. They allow a nurse or other medical professionals to serve the susceptibility to obtain more accurate and well-thought alternatives, which will ensure their life enhancement. Evaluation tools may be critical in developing the family dynamics, creating more consistent associations, and encouraging healthier lifestyles. There are several assessment tools, with others more effective in relation to other but are used differently, and it is the liability of professionals to utilize the most appropriate tool in their dynamic activities. The three assessment tools selected for this paper are 1) Adult Life Stress Measurement 2) Spiritual Well-Being Scale 3) Well Being Picture Scale. Families throughout the life cycle from young children to adults may apply these assessment tools (Monroe, 2008).

Adult Life Stress Measurement

Adult life stress has been postulated to be the main approach in the etiology and passage of both physical and psychological health results. A number of researchers to propose that stress per se may not have a crucial role in establishing health results, as indicated by the existing proof now has been unpredictable. Other studies, nevertheless, have claimed that various outcomes throughout the research surface from the application of varied measurement approaches. In accordance to this, two study traditions of typical condition are related with the assessment measurement of life stress:

1. Respondent-based assessment depended on the application of self-report checklists that respondents are needed to point the incidents they have encountered from a standard list of alternatives.
2. Examiner-depended assessment classically entails the utilization of a semi-formatted interview to prompt illustrations of incidents. These illustrations are afterwards presented to a team of raters who stated incidents and vital challenges alongside ratings through different speculative dimensions.

Therefore, an essential difference between these two approaches lies in the concept that for examiner-depended method, the basic liability for stating and classifying life stress inherent with the examiner, not with the respondent. In essence, the eventual interpretation of an incident as a life action or a vital challenge alongside the ratings given to that incident, for example, trained researchers in relation to the respondent’s self-report, leaving any details concerning the respondent’s real reaction to the incident, create threats or severity, independence, etc. These ratings are denoted to circumstantial and/or impartial ratings in contrast to the subjective ratings, which are the outcome of the self-report or responded-depended checklists (Brown & Harris, 2008).

Just as, the name suggests, this tool is bests suited for adult populations at various stages of stress complication. The application of the tool is somehow lengthy i.e. time consuming and requires more funds to administer. This is because nurses dealing with the old population need time to understand their needs and the stress level varies considerably among this the old. Consequentially, a consensus is surfacing in the context that the evaluation of circumstantial or impartial aspects – the individual and psychological situation that the stressor takes place is the main concern in understanding the association between that stressor and the product. In accordance with this, the illustration of stress alongside its influence may be observed as a procedure by which circumstantial occurrences are demonstrated by individuals in accordance to their individual resources and values and reaction to behaviorally, psychologically, and biologically. Therefore, a target on circumstantial aspects like prolonged problems, biographical situations, etc., which illuminate the implication of a given stressor to a given individual within a process framework can assist to account for the difference in response to that given stressor (Monroe, 2008).

Spiritual Well-Being Scale (SWBS)

The spiritual well-being scale refers to a common signal of alleged well-being that can be applied for the evaluation of both congregational and personal spiritual well-being. It offers a general measure of the feeling of spiritual quality of life, in addition to the subscale scores, for existential and religious well-being. The religious well-being subscale offers a self-evaluation of one’s association with God, whereas the existential well-being subscale provides a self-evaluation of individual thoughts of life meaning and life fulfillment. SWBS comprises of twenty objects, ten of which certainly evaluates religious well-being, while the other ten evaluates existential well-being. However, the standard approach for application of this scale is for one to administer personally, as it only covers 10-20 minutes to finish (Scott, Agresti, & Fitchett, 2007).

This tool is applicable to any population as it only consists of simple questions that anyone can answer. However, this takes little nurse time because it is a self-assessment tool. The spiritual well-being scale may be applied in different environments, which include clinical practice, health care, outcome assessment, and congregational assessment. In clinical practices, SWBS is significant for assessment of the well-being of counseling and clinical patients for both personal and team situations. For instance, given the increased proportion of persons in American population who practice some given religious beliefs or dedications, the experts usually see participants with religious beliefs. The demands for an expert to handle those religious matters, which may be comprised in their clients’ malfunctions, are currently well archived in professional settings. For health care, the SWBS is essential nursing care facilities, hospitals, rehabilitation centers, and other institutions interested with resident and patient care. The approach is essential in evaluating patient well-being pursuing disease, or surgery, in the face of chronic infections, or in development in rehabilitation plans. For outcome assessment, on the other hand, SWBS can be applied in organizations when an approach of well-being is required for patients in collective. Pastors may assist the nurse in this taking care of the patient or clergy person since this tool is more of spiritual healing (Scott, Agresti, & Fitchett, 2007).

The SWBS seems to contain sufficient justification for application of life symbols. SWBS scores correlated in forecasting methods with different other scales. Persons who attain high marks on SWBS incline to be lonely, largely have social talents, increased self-esteem, and extra intrinsic with their religious dedications. The SWBS, EWB, and RWB, all correlated constructively with meaning in life assessment. It has also been applied to evaluate spiritual well-being in terminally ill adults. Furthermore, the scale has been utilized to evaluate the associations between spiritual well-being and loneliness in a college set up alongside the terminally ill patients. Various researches on the relationship between loneliness and spiritual well-being in terminally ill and healthy population demonstrated a negative correlation between them. The researcher summed that terminal illness can be an aspect in activating the person preferred religion with faith in God, and have an association with God. Despite its initial scale objectives with religious populations and utilization extensively in spirituality, most of studies on this measure shows that its applications have increased to involve all fields (Ellison & Paloutzian, 2011).

Well Being Picture Scale

This is a newly created simple to use tool to compute thought of well-being in the widest likely range of population comprising individuals who for any given purpose are not so sick, or not able to read English text, or weak reaction to long or intricate approaches. Ten pairs each of 1-inch space drawings showing a thought of high or low well-being are organized at adjacent ends of a seven-select, or countless semantic variable scale. People are asked to identify a point beside every scale to show which picture they think largely like; i.e. mostly equivalent to an unlit or lighted candle. Efficiency of the tool was determined using a sample of over 2200 obviously healthy people from Japan, US, Taiwan, Africa, and Canada. The scale has also been translated to corresponding countries languages. Field examination has proved significant correlations between the technique and determined text tools, which investigate the well-being, comprising Cantril’s Ladder for Well-being (p < .05), and  Barrett’s approach of power as understanding involvement in change (p < .01) (Gueldner et al., 2005).

On the other hand, a number of features have been proposed for a perfect health status index. One of them that have most desirable features, and that have potential for handling all other aspects is the weighted life expectancy. This is obtained from the index of well-being illustrated in different publications. This scale has different applications especially when a person has been undergoing difficult situations such as death of a close friend or family member. The approach entails pointing what one thinks is the most appropriate, and various items may be compared. It is not necessarily restricted to lit or unlit candles, for example, pictures of a lion and the mouse. A person is supposed to look at the pictures and state the one they like. This will refill individual thoughts and feelings and nurse can easily know how such a person may be treated (Gueldner et al., 2005).

Conclusion

Assessment tool analysis as we have seen is an essential tool applied by nurses. Nurses encounter different situations and it is not always the medication that they prescribe to patients. Some especially the adults when sick need the attention of a specialist to identify all the issues, since in many conditions the adults suffer stress due to their different responsibilities. However, a combination of all the three assessment tools may be possible in some situations for effective healing process. Although the well-being picture scale is somehow complex, it is a recommended tool for those people suffering physical and emotional pain.