Pediatric Alert Score: evaluation of measurement properties

Area of Science:

• Pediatric healthcare
• Clinical assessment tools
• Patient safety

Background:

• Hospitalized children require reliable monitoring tools.
• The Pediatric Alert Score is a potential tool for assessing pediatric patient status.

Purpose of the Study:

• To evaluate the construct validity and reliability of the Pediatric Alert Score.
• To determine if the Pediatric Alert Score is a dependable tool for hospitalized children and adolescents.

Main Methods:

• Methodological study involving 84 children aged 0-14 years.
• Compared the Pediatric Alert Score with the Brazilian version of the Brighton Pediatric Early Warning Score.
• Assessed reliability using the intraclass correlation coefficient and construct validity using Spearman's correlation.

Main Results:

• The Pediatric Alert Score demonstrated high reliability with an intraclass correlation coefficient of 0.95 (95% CI: 0.93-0.97).
• A strong positive correlation (Spearman's coefficient = 0.53, p<0.0001) was found between the Pediatric Alert Score and the Brighton Pediatric Early Warning Score.
• These findings indicate good construct validity.

Conclusions:

• The Pediatric Alert Score exhibits strong construct validity and internal consistency in hospitalized children.
• The Pediatric Alert Score is a reliable tool that can be utilized to enhance patient safety in pediatric care.