General Functional Assessments

The tools for nutritional assessment include medical history and screening aides, physical examination and anthropometric measurements, biochemical assessment, and tests of immune function. A general health assessment and medical history are required to rule out causes of secondary malnutrition such as poor oral health, chronic illness, disease, and medication. Malnutrition is influenced by lifestyle, which includes alcohol usage in adults, food preference, eating habits, social interactions, and economic status. Various screening tools, such as the DETERMINE checklist (White et al., 1991), are available to assess the risk of malnutrition. 

The introduction of any modification to a formula or other dietary product for infants should be based on a systematic review of the relevant existing information to develop a clear hypothesis of the expected functional and clinical benefits. These reviews should be published or be made publicly available in other forms. Studies should be designed primarily to test these hypotheses, as well as making general nutritional assessments. 

The five organ functions assessed in safety pharmacology are the cardiovascular system, nervous system, respiratory system, gastrointestinal system and renal system. To these we would add general systemic metabolic functions, as these are amenable to collectiOTi of at least some biochemical and physiological data. 

If from the general risk assessment some form of Safety-Related Control Function (SRCF) is required, then there is a choice of which of the two standards (EN ISO 13849 or EN 62061) to follow in order to assess the safety requirements for each safety function and how to assess that any proposed system meets the requirements. In general if the safety protection is an electrical-based system either standard could be used. Figure 9.4 gives guidance on which is the more suitable standard based on the type of technology to be used for the safety function. 

A conceptual design of a land reclamation project defines the main outlines of the project. It describes the project in terms of a set of integrated ideas and concepts about what it should do, behave and look like. It includes the (general) functions of the fill mass performance and it should be sufficiently detailed as to allow a preliminary cost estimate and risk assessment of the project. 

The emergence of functional behavioral assessment and functional analysis has addressed some of the generalization obstacles described previously (Gresham, Watson, Skinner, 2001). The procedures for completing functional assessment and analysis are described elsewhere and are beyond the scope of this chapter (see Ervin et al., 2001 O Neill et al., 1997 Sterling-Turner, Robinson, Wilczynski,... 

While many of the techniques described in the subsequent sections of the chapter overlap with functional assessment and analysis techniques, the focus of this chapter is on generalization procedures that may be used with or without functional assessment or analysis. 

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