Validity and Reliability of the Dying Care Process and Outcome Scales Before and After Death From the Bereaved Family Members’ Perspective

Abstract

Objective:

There are no instruments evaluating the processes and outcomes of dying care right before and after death. Therefore, we developed and examined the validity and reliability of 2 scales for evaluating dying care processes and outcomes before and after death.

Methods:

A cross-sectional, anonymous questionnaire was administered to bereaved family members of patients with cancer who had died in 5 facilities. We evaluated the Dying Care Process Scale for Bereaved Family Members (DPS-B) and the Dying Care Outcome Scale for Bereaved Family Members (DOS-B) with 345 bereaved family members.

Results:

A factor analysis revealed that DPS-B and DOS-B each consisted of 4 subscales. For the DPS-B, they were “symptom management,” “respect for the patient’s dignity before and after death,” “explanation to the family,” and “family care.” For the DOS-B, they were “peaceful dying process for the patient,” “being respected as a person before and after death,” “good relationship between the patient and family,” and “peaceful dying process for the family.” Both DPS-B and DOS-B had sufficient convergent and discriminative validity, sufficient internal consistency (DPS-B: α = 0.91 and subscales’ αs = 0.78-0.91; DOS-B: α = 0.91 and subscales’ αs = 0.78-0.94), and sufficient test–retest reliability (DPS-B: intraclass correlation coefficient [ICC] of total score = 0.79 and subscales = 0.55-0.79; DOS-B: ICC of total score = 0.88 and subscales = 0.70-0.88).

Significance of Results:

Both DPS-B and DOS-B are valid and reliable scales for evaluating the dying care processes and outcomes before and after death from the bereaved family members’ perspectives.

Keywords

dying care process outcome neoplasms questionnaires bereaved family members

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