In support of the discipline of nursing: a nursing assessment.

The format of the nursing assessment frequently tends to be unit specific and secondary to the goals of other disciplines. This defeats the purpose of the holistic assessment that nurses consider essential. The framework of the eleven functional health patterns proposed by Gordon provides a strong focus for assessment of functional ability as the purpose for collection of assessment data. Data collected systematically in this way in any setting provide a definitive position from which nursing can contribute well-focused and well-documented input for more effective participation in institutional decision making.