Patient Education Competence Scale for Registered Nurses in Taiwan: Scale development and psychometric validation.

AIM: To develop a valid and reliable self-assessment scale that can be used by registered nurses in Taiwan to completely measure their patient education competence.

METHODS: The Patient Education Competence Scale for Registered Nurses was developed by using expert reviews, item analysis, exploratory factor analysis, criterion validity, and internal consistency and stability to test the construct validity and instrument stability.

RESULTS: The exploratory factor analysis of the Patient Education Competence Scale for Registered Nurses from 133 responses revealed 24 items loading on two factors: implementation of patient education and preparation for patient education. The Patient Education Competence Scale for Registered Nurses correlated positively with the Clinical Teaching Competence Inventory. The Cronbach's alpha ranged from 0.96 to 0.97 and the test-retest reliability ranged from 0.82 to 0.88.

CONCLUSION: The construct validity and internal consistency reliability of the Patient Education Competence Scale for Registered Nurses were supported. This scale reflected the characteristics of Taiwan's clinical nursing practice and it may be used to assess current patient education competence practice and the need for continuing education and study. However, additional research is needed to refine this scale and increase the possibility of generalizability.