Do we want an “age” axis to be used in every diagnosis from now on?
In the 12th edition of the NANDA-I Classification of Nursing Diagnoses, some of the new
diagnoses explored the use of the age axis, namely Risk for adult falls (00303), Risk for child falls
(00306), Adult pressure injury (00312), Risk for adult pressure injury (00304), Child pressure
injury (00313), Risk for child pressure injury (00286), Neonatal pressure injury (00287), and Risk
for neonatal pressure injury (00288).
Questions have raised on whether we intend to have the age axis added to all diagnoses. The
answer to that question is “No”. Any axis addition will be discussed based on its conceptual and
clinical helpfulness towards diagnostic accuracy. The use of the age axis in the diagnoses above
provided them with specificity that was deemed as clinically helpful. The risk factors Places child
on play equipment unsuitable for age group, Places child in bouncer seat on raised surfaces, and
Furniture placement facilitating access to windows, while specific for Risk for child falls, would
not be clinically helpful when assessing and adult.
We recommend the article “Call for the Use of Axial Terms”: Toward Completeness of NANDA-I
Nursing Diagnoses Labels by Miguel, Romeiro, martins, Casaleiro, Caldeira and Herdman,
available from https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/2047-3095.12228.
By: Camila Takao Lopes, Diagnosis Director, NANDA International