###### Abstract  
Background: Compassionate care has been increasingly highlighted in the past few decades worldwide, including in Malaysia. Despite acknowledging its importance, Malaysia still lacks a validated tool that can be used to assess the level of compassionate care from the patient's perspective. Therefore, this study aims to validate and translate the Relational Aspect of Care Questionnaire (RAC-Q) into the Malay language. Methods: Permission to use and translate the original RAC-Q into the Malay language was obtained. The RAC-Q was then translated into the Malay language following the 10 steps proposed for the translation of a patient-reported outcome questionnaire. A pretest was conducted based on 30 inpatients to assess the appropriateness and clarity of the finalized translated questionnaire. A cross-sectional study was performed based on 138 inpatients from six adult wards of a teaching hospital so as to validate the translated questionnaire. The data were analyzed using R software version 4.1.3 (R Core Team, Vienna, Austria, 2020). The results were presented descriptively as numbers and percentages or means and standard deviations. A confirmatory factor analysis was performed using robust estimators. Results: The analysis showed that the measurement model of the RAC-Q Malay version (RAC-QM) fits well based on several fit indices: a standardized factor loading range from 0.40 to 0.73, comparative fit index (CFI) of 0.917, Tucker-Lewis fit index (TLI) of 0.904, root mean square error of approximation (RMSEA) of 0.06, and a standardized root mean square residual (SRMR) of 0.073. It has good reliability, with a Cronbach's alpha of 0.857 and a composite ratio of 0.857. Conclusion: The RAC-QM demonstrated good psychometric properties and is valid and reliable based on the confirmatory analysis, and it can thus be used as a tool for evaluating the level of compassionate care in Malaysia. compassionate care; relational aspect of care questionnaire; confirmatory factor analysis; validity; reliability +
Footnote †: journal: International Journal of and Public Health  
all aspects of care, which include the functional, transactional, and relational aspects of care. The scarcity of resources in the healthcare system should not act as a barrier to the provision of high-quality care, which includes all aspects of their management. It is certain that a good patient experience not only improves the well-being of patients but also benefits the healthcare system as a whole. However, these aspects of care are, indeed, very complex and depend on the subjective experiences of individual patients [2], especially the relational aspect. Much work has been conducted in order to develop tools that can help us to accurately measure the relational aspect of care so that improvements can be made. Most of them have been developed for a unique target population. The importance of the relational aspect of care has also been emphasized in many other reports [3; 4; 5]. One of the infamous public inquiry reports that highlighted compassionate care is the Francis Report [6]. The inquiry was conducted as a consequence of many public complaints against the Mid-Staffordshire National Health Service (NHS) Foundation Trust concerning poor care. The report revealed many weaknesses in the system, but the most prominent was the lack of compassion among its staff. The report also highlighted the need for a measurement tool with which to properly assess compassion [6]. The Picker Institute Europe is among the organizations dedicated to nurturing compassionate care in the healthcare system. The organization has developed many measurement tools to cater to different target groups or healthcare settings. One of them is the Relational Aspect of Care Questionnaire (RAC-Q), which has been widely used across the UK. Many other measurement tools are being developed, validated, and reviewed.