AN ASSESSMENT OF THE RELIABILITY AND VALIDITY OF PHANEUF NURSING AUDIT SCORES.
Contributors: University of Alabama at Birmingham.
Published: 1984
Number of pages: 125
Subjects: Health Sciences, Nursing.
Description: The purpose of the study was to generate estimates of reliability and validity for the Phaneuf Nursing Audit instrument. The tool was used to rate 300 medical records of adult terminally ill cancer patients who expired during their final admission to a southeastern hospital during 1974-1979. A 63-case subsample was used to generate unweighted subscale scores. Inter- and intra-rater reliability was maintained above the .80 level throughout the data collection phase.

Audit results were consistent with findings available in the literature. Nurses documented technical aspects of care, observed symptoms and reactions, and consistently carried out physician's orders. Nurses failed to record basic documentation, initiate and maintain assessments and care plans of patients. Emotional aspects of care involving patients and families were not well documented. Patient teaching, promotion of health and physical activities were poorly documented. Quality profile scores for the sample resulted in a rating at the good level. The sample was found to be representative on the basis of age and sex using MANOVA (p = .05). Tentative support of moderately acceptable reliability and statistically significant validity was found. The Alpha coefficient for the total scale was .85. Estimates of validity utilizing the regression statistic produced significant F statistics for all seven subscales (p = .05).

Recommendations include: (a) replication of the study with other patient groups across settings and over time; (b) identification of baseline quality profiles and monitoring changes in institutions providing nursing care; (c) use of the instrument in nursing education programs to assess the practice of students, (d) for nursing service administration to monitor and enforce policies and procedures concerning nursing documentation; and (e) provision of continuing education for practicing nurses who care for terminally ill cancer patients.
Notes: Source: Dissertation Abstracts International, Volume: 46-02, Section: B, page: 0477.

Thesis (D.S.N.)--UNIVERSITY OF ALABAMA AT BIRMINGHAM, 1984.

School code: 0005.