The Outpatient Experience Questionnaire of comprehensive public hospital in China: development, validity and reliability

Abstract

Objective: The objective of this study is to describe the development of the Outpatient Experience Questionnaire (OPEQ) and to assess the validity and reliability of the scale.

Design: Literature review, patient interviews, Delphi method and Cross-sectional validation survey.

Setting: Six comprehensive public hospitals in China.

Participants: The survey was carried out on a sample of 600 outpatients.

Main outcome measure(s): Acceptability of the questionnaire was assessed according to the overall response rate, item non-response rate and the average completion time. Correlation coefficients and confirmatory factor analysis were used to test construct validity. Delphi method was used to assess the content validity of the questionnaire. Cronbach's coefficient alpha and split-half reliability coefficient were used to estimate the internal reliability of the questionnaire.

Results: The overall response rate was 97.2% and the item non-response rate ranged from 0% to 0.3%. The mean completion time was 6 min. The Spearman correlations of item-total score ranged from 0.466 to 0.765. The results of confirmatory factor analysis showed that all items had factor loadings above 0.40 and the dimension intercorrelation ranged from 0.449 to 0.773, the goodness of fit of the questionnaire was reasonable. The overall authority grade of expert consultation was 0.80 and Kendall's coefficient of concordance W was 0.186. The Cronbach's coefficients alpha of six dimensions ranged from 0.708 to 0.895, the split-half reliability coefficient (Spearman-Brown coefficient) was 0.969.

Conclusions: The OPEQ is a promising instrument covering the most important aspects which influence outpatient experiences of comprehensive public hospital in China. It has good evidence for acceptability, validity and reliability.

Keywords: OPEQ; comprehensive public hospital; outpatient experience; validity and reliability.