Assessment of clients is essential for effective treatment planning and implementation. Acute psychiatric settings in Occupational Therapy pose specific challenges due to their unpredictable nature, acute symptoms of clients and wide variety of client diagnoses and backgrounds. Therapists working in these settings need to be very skilled at effective assessment in short duration as clients’ symptoms and dysfunction keep fluctuating as against a chronic set-up with more stable clients. Common tools, presently in use, focus on specific areas or performance components and are restricted to a particular frame of reference. Problem Identification Grid is recommended for acute psychiatric settings for quick initial assessment of clients. It may be used as a checklist to identify areas of dysfunction and may help to broadly differentiate the higher functioning clients from the lower functioning ones. Due to its nature and design, it gives one glance idea about the client’s functioning and facilitates faster problem identification and goal setting. It covers performance areas like ADL, work and also components like physical abilities, cognitive functioning, communication skills, emotional aspects etc. Indian Journal of Occupational Therapy, 44 (2), 11-14