Evaluating patients' health using a hierarchical multi-attribute decision model.

Evaluation of a patient's health status is an essential part of the healthcare process. For this purpose, Henderson's model of basic living activities (BLA) is often proposed as a set of criteria to be used in nursing. Despite its clarity and theoretical background, the model is only partially used in clinical practice. In this paper, we present the methodology for a hierarchical multi-attribute decision model to increase the practical efficiency of the BLA model. The result is a computerized model for the evaluation of a patient's health status. This model was tested in clinical practice by 17 nurses in two health centres in Slovenia and a strengths, weaknesses, opportunities and threats (SWOT) analysis was carried out. The strengths included providing a holistic understanding of the nature and level of the nursing problems, enriching the documentation and reducing the possibility of overlooking something important. As a part of electronic documentation, this computerized model supports systematic patient data gathering and evaluation.