Development of a measuring tool for elderly care service needs in the community and its reliability and validity

Objective To develop a measuring tool for the elderly care service needs in the community. Methods Based on the literature search and Delphi expert consultation, a measuring tool for elderly care service needs was developed. The reliability (internal consistency coefficient) and validity (surface validity, content validity, criterion-related validity) of the developed measurement tool were evaluated with on-site expert consultation and the cross-sectional survey. Results A 11-dimension measurement tool was developed, which covered physical health, mental health and desires for old-age support assessment. The reliability evaluation showed that there was significant correlation (P<0.05) among the measurement dimensions of the physical health and the mental health of the elderly in community. The validity evaluation showed that the measurement methods for the measurement dimensions of the elderly care needs, including the evaluation items, evaluation methods, and rating methods, all got below 2 scores in applicability assessment, and the measurement methods of the self-care ability, vision, the self-willingness/information expression of the elderly, the ability of the elderly to understand the willingness/information expressed by others, and the ability to provide family care were all supported by more than 50% experts, which indicated that the surface validity and content validity were good. There was a significant positive correlation between the living places of the elderly and the needsof elderly care services (r=0.214, P<0.01), and there were significant correlations between all measurement dimensions with the living place except anxiety (P<0.05), which indicated that the measurement tool had an acceptable criterion-related validity. The consistency of self-supporting willingness, the family willingness to care for the elderly with the current old-age care place were relatively poor (Kappa=0.063, P=0.007; Kappa=0.051, P=0.006). Conclusion The overall performance of the measurement tool for the elderly care service needs developed in this study is acceptable. It has been approved by both the elderly care service suppliers and the elderly care service needs evaluators. It also shows some internal consistency in measurement results of the demanders, and is consistent with the actual living place. Key words: Elderly care service needs; Measurement tool; Reliability; Validity