Assess

ASSESS: verify the presence and severity of frailty

  • Verifying frailty and assessing a person’s level of frailty: Verification should always be carried out for those people identified by screening tools as possibly being frail.  This can be done both opportunistically and systematically. Professionals should use clinical judgement and a validated tool, either face-to-face with the person or non-face-to-face with knowledge of the person’s health, social and emotional status.
    • Verify the presence of frailty using clinical judgement and the Clinical Frailty Scale
    • Grade the severity of frailty using the Clinical Frailty Scale

For more information to aid local delivery see what works, resource links, benefits, evidence, local stories and case studies as well as impact/measures see Frailty Toolkit document page 39-42.

Useful resources

Clinical Frailty Scale – http://geriatricresearch.medicine.dal.ca/pdf/Clinical%20Faily%20Scale.pdf

Fusion48 – http://fusion48.net/frailty

Year of Care Partnerships – https://www.yearofcare.co.uk/care-and-support-planning

To understand a person’s needs and inform care and support consider the need for a Comprehensive Geriatric Assessment (CGA) – http://www.bgs.org.uk/cga-toolkit/cga-toolkit-category/what-is-cga/cga-what

Frailty: Language and Perceptions A report prepared by Britain Thinks on behalf of Age UK and the British Geriatrics Society. 2015 http://www.ageuk.org.uk/Documents/EN-GB/For-professionals/Policy/health-and-wellbeing/report_bgs_frailty_language_and_perceptions.pdf?dtrk=true

NHSE frailty heat maps – http://fusion48.net/frailty/frailty-contract-analysis/frailty-care-heatmaps

Population Health management Sheffield DPH (designing systems for multi-morbidity) – https://gregfellpublichealth.wordpress.com/2018/02/02/multi-morbidity-population-management-blended-with-a-person-centred-approach/