"Watch, Smell, Ask, Touch": Practices, Challenges, and Technological Support in Ability Assessment of Older Adults from Practitioners Perspectives in China

Abstract

As the global population ages, comprehensively assessing older adults’ physical, cognitive, and social capacities is increasingly crucial for guiding care decisions and resource allocation. While technology shows promise in enhancing these assessments, there is limited understanding of how practitioners conduct such assessments and how they perceive and experience assessment technologies in real-world settings. This paper presents an exploratory study of the practices and experiences of practitioners in China’s Ability Assessment of Older Adults (AAOA), based on 28 on-site observations and in-depth interviews with eight assessors in a large southeastern city. Our findings reveal the adaptive workflows, strategies, and diverse challenges faced by assessors, highlighting the complexity, context-specificity, and collaborative nature of these processes. While grounded in China’s evolving healthcare system, these findings also resonate with broader global challenges in aging care, particularly in resource-constrained settings. Based on these insights, we propose implications for designing practical assessment technologies and considerations for better supporting assessors and older adults across care contexts.