Health Belief Scale for Urinary Incontinence and Kegel Exercise: A Reliability and Validity Study

The aim of this study was to develop an instrument based on the Health Belief Model that measures urinary incontinence awareness and beliefs regarding pelvic floor muscle (Kegel) exercises.

Evaluation of validity and reliability of the novel instrument and analysis of sociodemographic variables based on responses to this 49-item scale.

The sample used to validate the instrument (n = 527) was drawn from patients cared for at the gynecology and obstetrics and urology polyclinic at Ondokuz Mayıs University Hospital. A majority of participants were female (n = 431, 81.8%) and their average age was 33.8 years (SD 12.3). The university is located in Samsun, a city located in northern Turkey. Data were collected between October 2019 and December 2020.

The Health Belief Scale for Urinary Incontinence and Kegel Exercise's validity was analyzed using a content validity index approach with 8 experts. Psychometric measurements were obtained using exploratory factor analysis and Cronbach's α reliability analysis. Exploratory factor analysis incorporated principal component analysis and varimax rotation. t Tests and 1-way analysis of variance were used to compare subdimensions of the Health Belief Scale for Urinary Incontinence and Kegel Exercise with some variables (sex, education status, marital status, make Kegel exercises regularly, etc).

Results supported a scale having 49 items and 6 subscales per factor analysis explaining 59.8% of total variance. With exploratory factor analysis, the Kaiser-Meyer-Olkin coefficient was 0.899 and Barlett test result was χ² = 18389.424 (P = .001). Cronbach's α coefficients for the scale varied between 0.79 and 0.94. Factor loadings per underlying dimensions ranged from 0.42 to 0.84.

The Health Belief Scale for Urinary Incontinence and Kegel Exercise is a valid and reliable instrument.