A patient-doctor relationship questionnaire (PDRQ-9) in primary care: development and psychometric evaluation

In health care research, the patient-doctor relationship as perceived by the patient is considered important. Our aim was to develop and validate a questionnaire that assesses the Patient-Doctor Relationship, the Patient-Doctor Relationship Questionnaire (PDRQ-9). The PDRQ-9 was developed out of the Helping Alliance Questionnaire of Luborsky, a scale that measures the therapeutic alliance in psychotherapy. Its psychometric qualities and validity in general practice were assessed, with the collaboration of 110 general practice patients and 55 patients in an Epilepsy Clinic. Principal components analysis demonstrates a two-factorial structure, one related to the doctor, and one related to the medical symptoms of the patient. Both show high reliability but as the second factor explains only 9% of the variance, it is eliminated from the questionnaire. The PDRQ-9 provides researchers a brief measure of the therapeutic aspects of the patient-doctor relationship in the primary care setting. It is a valuable tool for scientific and practical purposes involving the monitoring of the patient-doctor relationship.