In making a nursing assessment of someone in a care home, or potentially moving into one, the information will be used to determine what king of care they need and, where appropriate, which type of care home will be most suitable to meet their needs.

How to Write a Needs Assessment Report

1. Identify Your Purpose. Before you begin writing your needs assessment report, clearly identify the reason you’re writing it.
2. Gather Relevant Data.
3. Interpret and Analyze Your Findings.
4. Recommend Next Steps.

Types of needs assessment

• Gap or discrepancy analysis.
• Reflection on action and reflection in action.
• Self assessment by diaries, journals, log books, weekly reviews.
• Peer review.
• Observation.
• Critical incident review and significant event auditing.
• Practice review.

In order to effectively determine a diagnosis and treatment for a patient, nurses make four assessments: initial, focused, time-lapsed and emergency.

Needs assessment is a process for determining an organization’s needs. It usually consists of three main parts: Initiation. Data Collection & Analysis.

Seven Steps for Conducting a Successful Needs Assessment

1. Step one: Clearly define your needs assessment objectives.
2. Step two: Be realistic about your resources and capacity.
3. Step three: Identify target audiences and data sources.
4. Step four: Think small and big when summarizing results.
5. Step five: Get feedback.

These are assessment, diagnosis, planning, implementation, and evaluation.

• Assessment. Assessment is the first step and involves critical thinking skills and data collection; subjective and objective.
• Diagnosis.
• Planning.
• Implementation.
• Evaluation.