Development of a patient safety care activity scale for clinical nurses in Korea

BACKGROUND: The aim of this study was to develop a scale to measure patient safety care activities for clinical nurses and to verify validity and reliability it. METHODS: Literature review and expert consultation were utilized to develop the scale of the Patient Safety Care Activities. The validity and reliability analyses were conducted with 428 nurses working at 5 general hospitals. Exploratory factor analysis of the scale was performed, and convergent and discriminant validity as well as internal consistency reliability were determined. RESULTS: Eight subcategories (security, patient identification, operation (invasive procedure), medication, blood transfusion, management of infection, management of falls & sores, management of firefighting) with 44 items were validated to measure patient safety care activities. Convergent and discriminant validity indicated the applicability of the eight-factor Patient Safety Care Activities scale. The reliability of the Patient Safety Care Activities Scale was acceptable, with Cronbach’s a = .88 ~ .95. CONCLUSION: The developed scale showed content, construct validity, and reliability, as well as convergent validity for each item and discriminant validity between the factors. This makes it suitable for use in a diverse range of future studies on patient safety care activity.