Development and Psychometric Evaluation of a Professional Communication Questionnaire for the Operating Room

Effective communications play a significant role in environments where health care is provided. A review of the available literature did not yield a valid scale for evaluation of operating room nurse-doctor communication. Accordingly, the present study is an attempt at development and psychometric evaluation of a professional communication questionnaire for the operating room. The present study is a methodological work conducted in two steps. In the first stage of the study, 56 items on a 5-point Likert scale were developed according to the results of a review of relevant literature and several meetings with experts. Next, following a qualitative and quantitative evaluation of the face and content validity of the questionnaire, 41 items remained. An assessment of the construct validity of the questionnaire using factor analysis yielded six factors. In this stage, 410 operating room nurses and doctors who were randomly selected from six hospitals affiliated with the university participated. Cronbach's alpha for the internal homogeneity of the instrument was found to be .88; the results of the test-retest showed its consistency to be .91. The findings show that the developed instrument has enough validity and reliability to be used to evaluate professional communication in operating rooms.