Validation of the Italian version of the EUROPEP instrument for patient evaluation of general practice care

Objective: To describe the validity and reliability of the Italian version of the EUROPEP instrument for patient evaluation of general practice care. Methods: A survey was performed among patients who visited a general practice (n=983), using the 23-item EUROPEP questionnaire. The scores are aggregated in two dimensions: “clinical behaviour” and “organization of care”. The cultural adaptation of the questionnaire into Italian has been performed by using the formal translation procedures applied in other European countries. Data were analysed with respect to item response rate, item–scale correlation, internal consistency reliability and construct validity of the instrument. Results: The item response rate was good for 17 items, acceptable for four items and problematic for one item. The item–scale correlation largely exceeded a value of 0.40 for all items in both scales. The internal consistency of the aggregated scores was also very good, the reliability coefficients being 0.95 for “clinical behaviour” and 0.90 for “organization of care”. As expected, older age and better health status were associated with more positive evaluation of care.

Conclusion: Our study confirms that, even in its Italian version, the EUROPEP is a valid and easy-to-use instrument for gathering information on patients’ experience with and evaluation of general practice care.     

Development and validation of an in-patient satisfaction questionnaire.

OBJECTIVE: To develop a psychometrically sound, hospital patient satisfaction questionnaire to be administered to patients discharged from medical and surgical services. DESIGN: Cross-sectional survey in Spanish. SETTING: Four acute care general hospitals of the Basque Health Service. STUDY PARTICIPANTS: Random samples of 650 discharged patients from each hospital during February and March 2002. A total of 1910 patients responded to the questionnaire (73.5%). MAIN OUTCOME MEASURES: Overall perceived quality of health care and perceived health improvement. RESULTS: No sociodemographic differences were found between respondents and non-respondents. Six dimensions were identified from the factor analysis, explaining 50% of the variance. All items, except two, revealed loadings above 0.4. Cronbach's alpha exceeded 0.7 for all dimensions, except privacy. Comfort was the dimension with the lowest level of patient satisfaction, whereas privacy was the most satisfactory. The interscale correlations never exceeded the internal consistency of each scale. The analysis of the dimensions with two items of global assessment showed a positive correlation. CONCLUSIONS: The results obtained from the development and validation of the questionnaire provide evidence of its psychometric properties, although it would be useful to carry out further analyses to assess time-based properties of reliability. We found a positive relation between the degree of patient satisfaction and overall evaluation of the quality of health care, providing evidence of the ability of the questionnaire to correlate with other concepts. The in-patient satisfaction questionnaire could become a useful instrument in quality-of-care assessment.     

Development and Validation of the Nursing Home Care-related Quality of Life Scale

ObjectivesWe developed an instrument to assess nursing home residents' quality of life (QOL), with a focus on QOL-related factors modifiable through nursing home care, within the South Korean context; then, we tested its validity and reliability.DesignThe scale was constructed through a literature review, qualitative interviews, expert panel review, and a focus group interview; then, it was validated through survey research.Setting and participantsResidents (N = 667) from 42 nursing homes in South Korea participated in scale validation.MethodsNinety-nine items across 5 dimensions were initially drafted through a literature review and qualitative interview data. The expert panel review and a focus group interview yielded a scale with 31 items across 3 dimensions. Next, using survey data from nursing home residents, we examined the construct and concurrent validity and reliability (using Kuder-Richardson 20) of the 31-item QOL scale.ResultsThrough a series of factor analyses, the 31 items were reduced to 17 items across 2 dimensions: Environment and Services (13 items) and Social Interaction (4 items). This 17-item scale was further examined for model fitness and reliability. The scale had acceptable to good fit (root mean square error of approximation = 0.07 and 0.07; comparative fit index = 0.83 and 0.98 for Environment and Services and Social Interaction, respectively), and good concurrent validity and internal consistency (Kuder-Richardson 20 = 0.72).Conclusions and implicationsThis 17-item scale is a valid and reliable tool to assess nursing home residents' QOL in South Korea, with a focus on factors modifiable through nursing home care. Through more research to test its usefulness, validity, and reliability, the scale can be used as an index of nursing home care quality and contribute to the development of strategies to improve nursing home residents' QOL.     

Zufriedenheit in der Arztpraxis aus Patientenperspektive

The purpose of the study was to develop and to validate a standardized patient centered quantitative instrument to assess patient satisfaction in ambulatory care, to be used i.e. in quality management and benchmarking activities. Item selection for the instrument was based on an extensive qualitative pilot study. A pre-final version (containing 35 items) has been tested with 2.800 patients from 56 ambulatory care practices (bases for analysis: n= 969). After psychometric evaluation a modified version has been tested with 3.000 patients from 60 ambulatory care physicians. Answers from 1.387 patients (response rate: 46 %, 62 % female, mean age 52 yrs.) were available for analysis. The questionnaire was validated by testing for factorial validity (confirmatory factor analysis), convergent and divergent validity as well as reliability (internal consistency, cronbachäs alpha). The final version of the questionnaire contains four dimensions: patient-physician-interaction (8 items), information (8 items), office organization(4 items), professional competence (3 Items). Confirmatory factor analysis confirms the four hypothesized dimensions perfectly (GFI: 0.997). Reliability ranged from.75 and.95. The correlation’s between the sub-scales ranges from.76 to 47, indicating that the dimensions are not fully independent. All sub-scales correlate positively with global assessments of satisfaction with the physician. With satisfactory to good results for validity and reliability testing, the final questionnaire might be used fruitfully in quality management in primary care.     

The GPs' Experiences Questionnaire (GPEQ): reliability and validity following a national survey to assess GPs' views of district psychiatric services

BACKGROUND: The measurement of patient and professional views of quality are important components in the evaluation of health care delivery. OBJECTIVE: To describe the development and evaluation of the GPs' Experiences Questionnaire (GPEQ) for assessing the quality of community mental health clinics in Norway. METHODS: Design: Literature review, GP interviews, pre-testing of questionnaire items and a cross-sectional national survey. Setting: Postal survey of GPs in Norway evaluating 73 community mental health clinics in the five health regions in Norway during spring of 2006. Subjects: Three thousand four hundred and sixty-three GPs were sent a postal questionnaire with the GPEQ and were asked to assess their community mental health clinic responsible for general adult psychiatric services. RESULTS: Two thousand one hundred and thirty (61.5%) GPs returned a completed questionnaire. Low levels of missing data suggest that the questionnaire is acceptable. Factor analysis identified five scales: workforce situation (four items), discharge letter (three items), competence (four items), guidance (three items) and emergency situations (two items). All scales met the criterion of 0.7 for Cronbach's alpha and test-retest correlations were 0.72-0.87. The results of validity testing were as hypothesized with scale scores significantly related to knowledge of the community mental health clinic, overall satisfaction, negative experiences with the clinic, waiting time and acceptance of referrals. CONCLUSIONS: The GPEQ is a self-administered questionnaire that includes the most important aspects of the GPs' experience of quality at community mental health clinics. All scales have good evidence for internal consistency, test-retest reliability and validity.     

Psychometric Assessment of the Multidimensional Quality of Life Questionnaire for Persons with HIV/AIDS (MQOL-HIV) in a Sample of HIV-Infected Women

Since the late 1980s, several HIV-specific quality of life instruments have been developed; however, little testing has been done in terms of their validity and reliability for HIV-infected women. The purpose of this study was to test the content validity, concurrent validity, internal consistency, and test-retest reliability of the Multidimensional Quality of Life Questionnaire for Persons with HIV/AIDS (MQOL-HIV) in a sample of 85 HIV-infected women. The MQOL-HIV is a 40-item scale comprised of 10 dimensions. Most of the items and all of the domains were determined content valid but revision of some of the items and domains is recommended. Concurrent validity was measured between the MQOL-HIV and the MOS-HIV and ranged from 0.51-0.81 between similar domains. Of the 10 domains and the entire instrument, 7 had a Cronbach's alpha over 0.70 (range 0.43-0.92). Eight domains and the entire instrument achieved test-retest correlation coefficients over 0.70 (range 0.60-0.96). Although some revision may make the scale more content-valid for HIV-infected women, given due care in the interpretation of results, the MQOL-HIV can be used with female populations in its current form.     

Towards patient-centered health services in India--a scale to measure patient perceptions of quality.

OBJECTIVE: . (i) To develop a reliable and valid scale to measure in-patient and outpatient perceptions of quality in India and (ii) to identify aspects of perceived quality which have large effects on patient satisfaction. DESIGN: Cross-sectional survey of health facilities and patients at clinics. SETTING: Primary health centers, community health centers, district hospitals, and female district hospitals in the state of Uttar Pradesh in north India. MAIN OUTCOME MEASURES: Internal consistency, validity, and factor structure of the scale are evaluated. The association between patient satisfaction and perceived quality dimensions is examined. RESULTS: A 16-item scale having good reliability and validity is developed. Five dimensions of perceived quality are identified-medicine availability, medical information, staff behavior, doctor behavior, and hospital infrastructure. Patient perceptions of quality at public health facilities are slightly better than neutral. Multivariate regression analysis results indicate that for outpatients, doctor behavior has the largest effect on general patient satisfaction followed by medicine availability, hospital infrastructure, staff behavior, and medical information. For in-patients, staff behavior has the largest effect followed by doctor behavior, medicine availability, medical information, and hospital infrastructure. CONCLUSIONS: The scale developed can be used to measure perceived quality at a range of facility types for outpatients and in-patients. Perceived quality at public facilities is only marginally favorable, leaving much scope for improvement. Better staff and physician interpersonal skills, facility infrastructure, and availability of drugs have the largest effect in improving patient satisfaction at public health facilities.     

Validity of a job stressors measurement scale in nursing staff: the nursing stress scale]

BACKGROUND: The aim of this work was to determine the reliability and construct validity of a scale intended to measure job stressors to which hospital nursing staff may be exposed. SUBJECTS AND METHODS: The nursing stress scale contains 34 stressors. The scale's trans-cultural adaptation was carried out by means of the translation-back translation method. Validation was conducted on a random sample of 201 health professionals in a public hospital in Valencia. The reliability of the scale was assessed after its readministration on a sub-sample of 30 nursing professionals, with a 15 day interval. The construct validity was obtained through the correlation of the scale with another two scales: The 28 item version of Goldberg's General Health Questionnaire and 7 dimensions of the Health questionnaire SF-36. RESULTS: The scale in Spanish language contains 34 items after eliminating the first item from the original scale (N1: computer failure) and including a new item (E1: Frequent job interruptions). The distribution of scores obtained in the initial administration of the scale and fifteen days later do not differ statistically. The Cronbach's alfa coefficient is 0.92 for the total scale and in each of the sub-scales ranges between 0. 83 and 0.49. The correlation between the scale and the GHQ-28 items questionnaire is 0.34. For each one of the seven dimensions of the SF-36 questionnaire the correlations range between -0.21 and -0.31. CONCLUSION: The nursing stress scale is a useful instrument for measuring possible stressors in this collective. It has high internal consistency and construct validity, as does the original American version, however reliability is moderate.     

中国艾滋病病毒感染者生命质量测定量表的编制

目的编制用于测定中国HIV感染者生命质量的量表，评价其信度和效度。方法参考现有量表，并与相关专家、基层疾病预防控制人员、HIV感染者进行访谈以形成初始量表，在443例HIV感染者中试用。根据条目应答率、因子分析、相关系数矩阵、内部一致性分析等进行条目精简，形成最终量表。分析最终量表的信度和效度。结果形成的中国HIV感染者生命质量量表（QOL—CPLWHA）共44个条目。各维度没有严重的天花板效应和地板效应（最高为21．0％），内部一致性信度系数均≥0．70，全量表的为0．90。量表总分2周重测信度系数为0．80，有2个维度的重测信度系数低于0．6，4个维度的在0．6～0．7之间。各条目的成维率均为100％。量表总得分与SF-36总得分的spearman相关系数为0．69。结论所形成的QOL—CPLWHA量表首次引入了敌意心理趋势维度。量表具有较好的内部一致性信度、结构效度及内容效度等，可应用于中国HIV感染人群。     

Patient perception of quality following a visit to a doctor in a primary care unit

BACKGROUND: Assessment of the quality of primary care services may be enhanced by including patient perceptions as well as professional judgment of quality. There is a need for reliable and valid instruments to measure these perceptions. OBJECTIVES: (i) To present a scale for measuring patient perception of quality of care following a visit to a doctor; and (ii) to analyse the responses given by patients recruited in primary care units in the Montreal region. The scale is composed of 22 items regrouped into three sub-scales referring to the patient-physician relationship (five items); the technical aspects of care (12 items); and the outcomes of the visit (five items). Distinctive features of the scale are that it focuses on patients' opinions about quality rather than on satisfaction, and that it includes items related to outcomes of the visit. METHODS: A survey was conducted on 473 patients who visited a physician in 11 primary care units in the Montreal region. Randomly selected patients received mailed questionnaires 5-7 days following their visit. Various statistical procedures were used to assess the reliability and the validity of the global scale and the sub-scales, and to analyse patients' patterns of response. RESULTS: The analysis of the psychometric properties of the global scale and the three sub-scales provides favourable evidence concerning their reliability and validity. The results of the factor analysis, the inter-item correlations and the Cronbach's alpha coefficients all support the distinction made between the interpersonal processes, the technical processes and the outcomes, and, at the same time, confirm the complex nature of the notion of perceived quality. The analysis of patients' responses allows the identification of items associated with global perception about quality of care. This global perception results from patients' perception of the physician's professional and interpersonal skills as well as from the outcomes of care. CONCLUSION: The scale can be used by physicians or primary health care units and has a wide range of applications.