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Resources from the book

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Assessment of capacity to consent to care or treatment arrangements in hospital or a care home: A semi-structured interview

Although most assessments of admission to hospital or a care home may be fairly straight-forward, there are some which are more complex. See Chapter 28 in the book for more information. This interview can give you ideas for the less complex assessments or can be used in full for the more complex ones. Please see the DoLS capacity assessment protocol example to gain an idea of how this can be used in practice. This is a relatively new interview which has not been thoroughly tested yet and so feedback after you have used it would be appreciated. Constructive criticism will be considered and possibly incorporated.
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DoLS capacity assessment protocol example

Most assessments of capacity to consent to care or treatment arrangements in hospital may be carried out by nursing or medical staff on admission. However, more complex assessments require the expertise of different professions and so this protocol was developed to facilitate decision-making regarding what level of assessment is required, which professions should be involved and which assessments should be used.
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Semi-structured interview regarding capacity to make a decision about swallowing – Mary Salmon, Speech and Language Therapist

This is a downloadable version of the interview in Appendix 4 of the book. It should be used in conjunction with the advice in Chapter 15 of the book.
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Assessment of capacity to manage own financial affairs/property: A semi-structured interview

This is a downloadable version of the interview in Appendix 5 of the book. It should be used in conjunction with the advice in Chapter 18 of the book.
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Assessment of capacity to make or revoke a Lasting Power of Attorney (Property and Affairs): A semi-structured interview

This is a downloadable version of the interview in Appendix 6 of the book. It should be used in conjunction with the advice in Chapter 18 of the book. This assessment can be carried out alongside an assessment of capacity to manage finances or independently. There are multiple choice questions below that can be used with this assessment for people who have speech, language and/or cognitive communication problems.
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Additional questions to ask when assessing capacity to make or revoke a Lasting Power of Attorney (LPA) if a capacity assessment regarding managing financial affairs has not been carried out

A person does not have to have the capacity to manage their finances in order to have the capacity to make an LPA but they do need to have a rough idea of their finances in order to appreciate what they are asking the attorney to manage and to be able to pick the best attorney for the job. If you have not done a capacity assessment regarding managing finances, this document can give you an idea of the questions that need to be asked regarding the person’s financial situation when assessing capacity regarding an LPA. It should be used in conjunction with the advice in Chapter 18 of the book.
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Assessment of capacity to make a decision about drinking alcohol after a brain injury or alcohol-related brain damage: A semi-structured interview

This is a downloadable version of the interview in Appendix 8 of the book. It should be used in conjunction with the advice in Chapter 23 of the book.
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Adapted semi-structured interview for assessing mental capacity with people who have speech, language and/or cognitive communication problems

A joint assessment with a Speech and Language Therapist is always recommended if someone has speech, language and/or cognitive communication problems; however, this is not always possible. This document gives some ideas of how to re-word and present questions from the semi-structured interview to assess someone’s capacity to make a decision about their care needs on discharge and/or discharge destination. It also gives ideas for pictures or photos that could be used alongside the assessment. There are various sources for accessing such pictures, but these often have a cost. Due to the nature of speech and language problems, it is not possible to make an interview that would meet everyone’s needs and so these ideas should be adapted to the person’s needs. See Chapter 11 of the book for more information. The interview should be used in conjunction with the advice in Chapter 16 of the book.
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Lasting Power of Attorney (LPA) capacity assessment: Multiple choice questions for people who have speech, language and/or cognitive communication problems

This assessment can be used with people who are able to understand information but may only be able to respond with yes/no or moving their eyes to answer questions consistently. It covers the main aspects of the assessment of capacity to make or revoke an LPA. It should be used in conjunction with the advice in Chapter 18 of the book.
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‘Capacity Assessing in Practice’ Training: Example lesson plan

The Capacity Assessing in Practice Training ran for several years in Manchester and was well received. It was in addition to the mandatory Mental Capacity Act 2005 training and was for people who were regularly assessing people’s capacity. This example lesson plan gives you an idea of what aspects were included if you are thinking of designing your own training. See Chapter 33 of the book for more information.
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MDT Capacity Assessments Questionnaire from Training pilot study

The Capacity Assessing in Practice Training ran for several years in Manchester and was well received. When it first started, we ran a pilot study to assess its efficacy and part of the assessment process included asking the MDTs on some of the wards most frequented by the attendees how they experienced capacity assessments before and after the training. See Chapter 33 of the book for more information.
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Free Resources

Remote Assessment of Capacity Checklist

Assessments of mental capacity to consent to care or treatment arrangements as part of a Deprivation of Liberty Safeguards (DoLS) authorisation application are not always possible face to face and more are being carried out by video link or telephone. This brings its own challenges, and it can be difficult to keep an assessment on track. This checklist was developed as part of a research study during the first lockdown due to Covid-19 as a guide and aide-memoir for professionals carrying out remote capacity assessments. It can be used in conjunction with the ‘Assessment of Capacity to Consent to Care or Treatment Arrangements in Hospital or a Care Home: A semi-structured interview’ above.

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MDT Capacity Questionnaire

This questionnaire was initially developed for a research study looking at the assessment of capacity regarding discharge destination but was found to be useful by the researcher and the MDT and so they continued to use it clinically. It can also be utilised, if you are an independent assessor, to gain more information from staff who know the person to be assessed. See Chapter 16 of the book for more information.

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Best Interests Decision Tree

This decision tree puts the information from the Mental Capacity Act 2005 Code of Practice (2007) into easy steps to follow when making best interests decisions.  See Chapter 29 of the book for more information.

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Assessment of capacity to make a decision about discharge destination and/or care needs on discharge: A semi-structured interview

This semi-structured interview is an updated version of one developed for a research study in 2004 (see the interview for the publication reference).  It has been widely used and updated several times following feedback from different professionals.  It should be used in conjunction with the advice in Chapter 16 of the book.

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