Health Assessments - for age 75 plus

From the year dot GP's have been doing all manner of extra things for older people. Medicare has introduced new item numbers to allow us to do many services all at once. Even better for older people we are encouraged to do them every year. The assessments are carried out at the centre, the home or a combination of both. We do this with a combination of doctor and registered trained nurse input.
We cover many areas starting with a brief check up of heart, lungs, blood pressure, vision, hearing, dentition to name a few then look at your history, your current medication, other over the counter preparations (including herbal medicines) and look for drug interactions side effects etc. We then look at immunisation status, your last ECG, and your most recent blood count and kidney function test. After this we look at whether there are any limitations to your mobility, sleep pattern, normal day activities, any continence problems, nutrition, mental functioning including mood, and then finish with a component that checks how independent you are or if you are getting help about the home for any tasks you cant do yourself. We double check whether you are a carer for someone else (a spouse maybe) as we know this creates extra demands in several areas.
From August 2000 we have systematically commenced offering these assessments to anyone over 75 years of age. There is no compulsion. However can we take this opportunity to tell you that there are many benefits arising from our initial assessments.