Increasingly nursing is recognizing the significance of the family to the health and well being of individual family members (wright &Leahey, 2000). Hatrick (1998) suggests family nursing in undergraduate nursing education will provide nurses with theoretical and practical skills to work effectively with families. This paper will demonstrate the assessment of one family using the Calgary Family Assessment Model (CFAM) as well as the Calgary Family Intervention Model (CFIM). The CFAM will provide information on the structural, developmental and functional components of the family. The family's strengths and weaknesses are identified, and the role of a community resource in this family's life is described. This discussion will demonstrate the relationship these concepts have on health and nursing in the family. All member of the family interviewed for this assignment agreed to participate but their names have been changed to ensure confidentiality.
             The CFAM is an integrated conceptual framework developed by Wright and Leahey for use when interviewing and making assessment of families. The CFAM consists of three major categories: structural, developmental and functional. Each category contains its own subcategories that may be relevant or appropriate depending on the family being assessed. This assessment focuses on the interaction among all of the individuals withing a family.
             Structural assessment aims to identify who is in the family, relationships among family member and those outside the family, and the family's context. (Wright and Leahey, 2000). The Smith family is a white single parent family consisting of Heather and her two year old daughter Brianna. Brianna's father has not lived with them for a year and a half and currently lives two hours away, as do Heather's family. Brianna has weekly contact on the phone with her father and stays with him one weekend a month. Heather's parents divorced when she was th...