A. GIGANTESCO, E. CHIAIA, P. MOROSINI, A. BALBI - Vol. 9, March 2003, Issue 1
Testo Immagini Bibliografia Summary Indice
Validazione di uno strumento di valutazione
dell’opinione dei pazienti e dei familiari dei servizi di salute mentale
Validation study of an instrument for the evaluation of patients and relatives
opinion in mental health services
Objectives
Development and validation of a self-rated questionnaire to assess patients' and relatives’ opinion about quality of care in mental health services.
Methods
Four versions of the questionnaire, which came out from two focus group, have been developed: a) for inpatients; b) for outpatients; c) for relatives of inpatients; d) for relatives of outpatients. The versions for patients consist of 15 items each. The versions for relatives are very similar and consist of 14 items each. The various versions were evaluated for internal consistency, and test-retest reliability, that was performed on a sample of 50 patients and 50 relatives.
Results
Time of completion was relatively brief, ranging on average from about 14 to 17 minutes. The internal consistency of the various versions of the questionnaire was found to be high, with Cronbach’s alpha coefficients ranging from 0.86 for the relatives’ versions to 0.89 for patients’ versions. Test-retest reliability of the questionnaire was also found to be satisfactory, with values of the intra-class correlation coefficient higher than 0.70 for most items, and not lower than 0.60 for any item.
Conclusions
The questionnaire is reliable and acceptable and it may be useful for evaluating patients’ and relatives’ opinion on care in mental health services. Because of its user-friendliness, it may be particularly suitable for routine use, particularly for implementation of Continuous Quality Improvement (CQI) studies.