Content Validity of the AHRQ Health Care Professional Survey on Informed Consent: A Methodological Study

Abstract

Objective: To assess the content validity of the Agency for Health Research and Quality (AHRQ) healthcare professional survey on informed consent. Background: The AHRQ has developed the healthcare professional survey on informed consent to assess the impact of the informed consent quality improvement training module on the healthcare professional knowledge, practices, and attitudes about informed consent. Methods: A qualitative study was carried out as part of a doctorate student dissertation study to assess the healthcare providers' and patients' perspectives and experiences on the informed consent process utilizing a descriptive, cross-sectional study design. The researchers have contacted 13 experts by email, asking for their voluntary support to validate the survey. The researchers adopted five domains of content validity measures, including relevancy, sufficiency, simplicity, clarity, and ambiguity. A four-point Likert scale was adopted and communicated to the experts to guide their scoring criteria. Preliminary pilot testing was done to assess the psychometric properties of the newly modified tool. Results: Seven experts have responded and shared their feedback either through email or hard copies, representing a response rate of 53.8%. Only one survey item scored less than 0.78 on I-CVI and was dropped from the survey. One subscale, “the Informed consent process overall effectiveness,” was dropped from the study as it falls below the acceptable level of 0.9. All edits requested by the experts' panel were done. The psychometric properties were then tested, and further enhancement of the tool was done to reach the acceptable Cronbach's alpha level. Conclusion: The AHRQ initiated the first stage of survey item development, and this study continued the efforts by validating the content of the survey and testing its content validity. The final poll was judged to have excellent content validity, good psychometric properties, and 41 items.