While we're familiar with the routine physical exams we get each year from our family doctors, many of us have never had a comprehensive health assessment. A comprehensive health assessment is an in-depth, head-to-toe exam that lasts several hours. An important part of the process is the comprehensive health assessment questionnaire.
What's Involved in a Comprehensive Health Assessment?
“A comprehensive health assessment is done by a multi-disciplinary team of health professionals, including a kinesiologist - who is an exercise specialist, a dietitian, a physician and often a nurse. It is approximately a four-hour assessment,” says Dr. Peter House, a physician and HealthChoicesFirst.com partner. “It looks at the history of the patient and the family, it looks at appropriate laboratory tests to screen for various diseases and conditions, it looks at fitness, which includes strength, flexibility and aerobic capacity, and it looks at nutrition in a comprehensive manner.
“A comprehensive health assessment also includes an audiogram to evaluate hearing, a vision assessment and glaucoma testing, lung function testing, and resting cardiogram. In conclusion of that, you have a stress test when indicated, according to age and gender.”
The comprehensive health assessment will be customized to each individual, and the physician can order or retract diagnostic tests or screening procedures depending on the client's health needs.
Executive Health Assessments
More and more companies are realizing the benefits of executive health assessments. Promoting employee health leads to a reduction in costs associated with medical care and absenteeism, and increases productivity in the workplace. Part of an executive health assessment is a professional consulting session to help employees set health and fitness goals and modify lifestyle behaviours.
To help the healthcare team carefully evaluate a patient's health before a comprehensive health assessment or executive health assessment, he or she will be given a health questionnaire that asks about family history, lifestyle habits, mental health and environmental exposure to certain toxins. This helps the team get a clear picture of a patient's health and allows them to make relevant recommendations after the comprehensive or executive health assessment.
Is it time for you to get a comprehensive or executive health assessment?
“A comprehensive health assessment is indicated in well, healthy people starting at age 40, both for males and females, but for people with pre-existing diseases, conditions or serious risk factors, it could be started at any time, including childhood. That, of course, would be a different model than an adult model.”