Bia's Five Assessments: A Case Study

BIA completes the remaining three assessments. For the purpose of my learning in this study I have completed the five assessments.
I began by assessing Mr Jones’s age. The purpose of establishing his age is because DoLS only applies to the people that are over the age of 18. This is in line with the DoLS CoP (MoJ 2008, p10, para1.12) which state that “The safeguards only relate to people aged 18 and over”. It is vital for the BIA assessor not to confuse themselves regarding the age limits on application of the MCA and the DoLS. MCA is applicable to individuals aged 16 and over. At the age of 16 an individual can have a mental capacity assessment. If they are deemed to lack capacity for a specific decision, they would not be eligible for DoLS
The assessor must assume the individual has capacity to make his or her own decisions, unless it is proved otherwise. When assessing Mr Jones, I was not Judgemental or concluded he had not capacity because of his age.This approach is underpinned by Health and Care Professional Council (HCPC) (2017, p.8 standard of Proficiency (SoP 6). Furthermore, I assumed that Mr Jones had the capacity to make decisions, therefore, I spoke to him and asked him general questions about his daily living activities like any other human being. However, the conversation became challenging, Mr Jones seemed confused about who I was. He thought I had come for a job interview in his construction company. He appeared to believe that he was still actively working in a construction site. On realisation that Mr Jones was confused, I then applied principle two of the MCA, which emphasises that people must be given all appropriate help before anyone concludes that they cannot make their own decisions. This approach can be related to case law of CC v KK [2012], where the judge stressed the importance to support an individual to meet their needs prior to making a decision that they lack capacity. On reflection of CC v KK, I arranged for Mr Jones’ assessment