Family assessment

Overview

 Family assessment is an activity of identifying factors that affect the entire family. The role of family assessment is to maximize the child's safety, minimize future maltreatment, maintain child's well-being and build a healthy family. In the assessment, family members are able to share details, build trust, create goals and interventions and identifying and implements the family resources needed for family development (Wilkinson, 2003). Family assessment involves many things such as the discussion of social protection. Development and physical survival. Through a shared experience and interaction, family members are able to create emotional bonding and future goals.

  Interview structure

 In the entire process, I used three main steps. The first step is engagement- in this stage, I greeted the family and developed a therapeutic relationship and mutual alliance. As a social worker, I was a stranger to the family but the engagement stage showed competence and caring.  Secondly, I entered the stage of problem identification.  After knowing each other and obtaining an informed consent, I asked the family the concern that needs to be addressed and changed.  Third, I entered the intervention stage where I focused on the need for change and the best approaches (Wright & Leahey, 2013).

The family that I assessed comes from my neighborhood.  I had prepared myself well for the family assessment and I was interested in investigating three domains namely' child's development, parents' capacity toward promoting child development and environmental factors. In these domains, I would include vital areas of concern such as family relationships, violence, and abuse, sexual concern, and betrayals. Immediately after entering the home, I did not use social coercion but I first asked for an informed consent from both parents.  I introduced myself as a qualified social worker and my role in assessing the families to identify the family needs, risks and provide the way forward in addressing the needs.  Before providing the consent, parents were concerned about confidential matters and I promised them that the information that I will receive from them will be confidential.  I obtained an informed consent prior to commencing the family assessment. We schedule a date for the family assessment for the purpose of helping the family get prepared for the assessment and also as a social worker get enough time to prepare interview questions. We agreed that the assessment would be done in two weeks' time and the assessment will take utmost 20 minutes.

 Family composition

  The family I assessed is a nuclear family which is made up by father, mother and three children. The father (Andrew)   has 37 years, the mother (Linda) has 34 years, and the firstborn (Liam) has 14 years, the second born (Olivia) 10 years and the third born (Ava) 4 years.  Both parents have been in the marriage for 16 years and they have never divorced.  Liam is in the ninth grade, Olivia is in fifth grade and Ava is in Pre-Kindergarten. The family is a middle-class family since the mother is a teacher by profession and the father is a human resource manager.  The family has its own home and both parents have vehicles and they normally go for family vacation during holidays.

 

 Strengths of the family

   In the assessment, I learned that the family has strengths in that both parents and children have a strong relationship. The relationship is significant as it promotes the child's development and helps them perform well in school. The relationship also helps the parents cooperate in parenting by making decisions together and helping each other in times of difficulties. The family prays together, encourages each other and shows commitment. I also observed the communication and found it has effective communication since the family members give each other the opportunity to talk, raises ideas and solves problems together.  The family also value the culture or family traditions such as attending religious events, going to the stadium and cooking traditional meals like apple pie.

Areas of concern

             By asking open-ended questions, I concentrated on three important areas. The first area was based on child development. The parents are providing education support to their children and there is a strong bond between the parents and children. However, the health of the children is not good since the first born and second born are obese or in other words, they have an abnormal weight. Being a middle-class family, they can access candy and dessert, sugary drinks, fast foods, snack and they do not exercise much to burn the calories. Also, the health of the parents is at risk since both are drunkards. The parents reported that every weekend, they socialize with their friends in attending events where they enjoy themselves in all sort of things including taking alcohol. Second, parents capacity in raising the children is high since they meet the basic needs, provides emotional warmth and guidance. I also found that the environmental factors that have made the family be in its current situation are employment, good housing, higher income and positive social relation with the wider family and the community.  Remarkably, the family is not involved in abusive behaviors since the children reported that they have never been sexually or physically abused in the home and outside the home. The parents also denied sexual and physical abuse and reported a strong love in their marriage.

 Interventions

            The family is suffering from health issues and it is ready to accept any form of assistance or intervention to avoid alcoholism and make healthy food choices. As a social worker, I would like to connect the family with Sanford Health- a non-profit organization that is dedicated to providing families with health information regarding nutrition and fitness. The organization aims at helping children and adults lead a healthy lifestyle to eliminate health risks. Poor food choices and lack of exercise are the main cause of obesity and the lack of proper management would lead to illnesses such as high blood pressure, diabetes and cardiovascular diseases.  I would recommend the family to join the ‘fit' initiative established and supported by Sanford Health.  'Fit' will help the family make better food choices and do exercises.  As a social worker, I have the role and responsibility for aftercare services and this includes supporting the family to ensure that they receive the best education from the agency and that they are managing alcoholism and obesity (Thomlison, 2013).

 

 

 

References 

Wilkinson Ian (2003). Child and Family Assessment: Clinical Guidelines for Practitioners. Routledge

 Thomlison, B., & Thomlison, B. (2016). Family Assessment Handbook. Delmar Cengage Learning.

 Wright, L. M., & Leahey, M. (2013). Nurses and families: A guide to family assessment and intervention.

Philadelphia: F.A. Davis.