Methodologic dilemmas in tapping the concept of patient needs

Patients' awareness of their own physical and emotional needs during hospitalization and nurses' perception of those needs were tested by a questionnaire constructed for the purpose. The test took place in five units of a large university medical center and included 30 patients and their 20 nurses. A comparison group included ten patients and eight nurses. Despite apparent reliability after pretesting, the questionnaire proved unreliable after use with the study group. This difference may have resulted from differences in responses between the pretest and study groups or from interviewer variability. Or contrary to pretest findings, the real contents of physical and emotional needs may not have been tapped.