Design and Psychometrics of Measurement Tool of Health Needs in Patients with Chronic Back Ache

Abstract

he necessity of valid, reliable and objective toolsis one of the subjects that have always beenemphasized in studies related to the health ofindividuals. However, it is believed that existing tools generallydo not have the necessary credibility and validityand cannot correctly assess the health needs of patientswith chronic back ache. This study aimed to design a validand reliable tool for assessing the health needs of patientswith chronic back ache.This is an exploratory sequential mixed (qualitative-quantitative)method research conducted in medical sciencesclinics of the Ministry of Health and Medical Education inShiraz in 2017. In the qualitative content analysis phasethrough interview with patients, their family carers, thetreatment team in relation to these patients, the healthneeds of patients with chronic back ache were definedand then, based on the findings and with extensive reviewof the texts, the tool’s dimensions and items weredesigned. Then, in the quantitative phase of the psychometricsof tool, the content (quantitative and qualitative)validity and structural validity (factor analysis) were doneby using different methods of formal (quantitative andqualitative) validity. Reliability was also calculated throughinternal consistency and stability.29 people are the participants included patients withchronic back ache, family carers and specialists associatedwith the disease. The health needs of patients withchronic back ache were explained in four dimensions: educationand information needs, spiritual / religious needs,socio-economic needs, and physical-psychological needs.Based on these four dimensions, 109 original items weredesigned. 91 items in the Item Impact section acquiredthe scores 1/5 and higher. In terms of content validity, 49items received 0.49 and higher. The content validity indexof the individual items was equal to one, and the contentvalidity index of the entire tool, both as S-CVI / Universaland as S-CVI / Average, was 1 at this stage. The kappacoefficient of all the terms was equal to one.In this structure, using exploratory factor analysis, fourfactors were also explained; they were named based onthe items of each group. The internal consistency of thetool by calculating the total Cronbach’s alpha coefficientwas 0.75, which was 0.73 in education and 0.72 in social/economic needs, 0.74 in physical needs and 0.72 inpsychological needs. The intra-cluster correlation wasequal to …The designed tool for the needs of chronic back ache patientshas different dimensions and has a good validity andreliability. This tool can provide an appropriate assessmentof the health needs of patients with chronic back acheand improve the quality of services provided to patients.