Translation, adaptation and psychometric validation of the Good Perioperative Nursing Care Scale (GPNCS) with surgical patients in perioperative care

Abstract

Aim: To test the psychometric validity of the Good Perioperative Nursing Care Scale (GPNCS), a self-administered questionnaire, following translation and adaptation.

Introduction: Patients' satisfaction with and experience of nursing care in orthopaedic or perioperative settings are currently not routinely measured and few standardized patient-reported experience measurement tools exist for these settings.

Materials and methods: Cross-sectional survey. The 34-question, seven-factor questionnaire was translated, adapted, and face-validated; the translated version was then validated with a group of surgical patients in perioperative settings. The internal consistency of the translated version was validated and tested using confirmatory factor analysis combined with Cronbach's alpha.

Results: In the orthopaedic department of a regional public hospital, 361 acute, traumatic and elective surgical patients were screened for eligibility; 215 were included. The full-scale model fit estimates were moderate. Factor loadings typically ranged from 0.65 to 0.97, except for the questions concerning Technical Skills (0.38-0.63) and Nursing Process (0.28). The Cronbach's alpha value for the total scale score was 0.92, with subfactors ranging from 0.72 to 0.87.

Conclusion: Providing evidence for quality, or lack thereof, the Danish version of the GPNCS is a valid tool for measuring surgical patients' experiences with perioperative nursing care. The electronic version proved practical.

Relevance to clinical practice: The validated Danish version of the tool will help healthcare professionals to identify areas of nursing care that need improvement, facilitate international benchmarking of units and enable comparison of care quality, nationally and internationally.

Keywords: Nursing care; Patient experience; Quality of care; Validity.