The Survey for Nursing Management Behavior of Diabetes Liaison Nurses in Guangdong Province

Aim: To develop a specific nursing work assessment scale for diabetes liaison nurses to standardize their practice. Background: Currently, there are no validated tools to assess the special practices of diabetes liaison nurses; therefore, the efficacy of these nurses cannot be evaluated properly. Design: The Delphi method, using 12 nurse experts from 8 tertiary hospitals in China, was used to construct the diabetic liaison nurse work assessment scale based on the Hamric Model of Advanced Practice Nurses. The scale was then tested on 21 diabetic liaison nurses. Method: An expert panel participated in 2 rounds of Delphi exercises to develop the assessment scale for diabetic liaison nurses by consensus using a Likert scale to indicate whether a dimension or item should be included in the assessment scale. The initial scale was then revised based on the suggestions from the experts’ importance ratings. The final version of the scale was formed after 2 Delphi rounds and was tested for applicability in a preliminary test with 21 diabetic liaison nurses. A convenience and cluster sample of 426 diabetes liaison nurses from 25 hospitals in Guangdong province was invited to participate and complete the scale. Results: Experts reached consensus on a scale with 4 dimensions and 13 items. The item-level content validity index was 1 for 10 items and ≥ 0.75 for 3 items, and the scale-level content validity index was 0.96. The reliability was high; Cronbach's alpha was 0.851, and the retest reliability was 0.822. Construct validity was supported by the results of factor analysis; the Kaiser-Meyer-Olkin measure of sampling adequacy was 0.822, and Bartlett's Test of Sphericity was statistically significant (P < 0.0001). Four components with eigenvalues > 1 accounted for 69.93% of the total variance. The results of the Rotated Component Matrix demonstrated that the factor loading of 12 items was > 0.6. Conclusion: The content validity of the scale was high; The specific nursing work assessment scale for diabetes liaison nurses is a promising tool that can be used to evaluate the specific nursing practices of diabetes liaison nurses. Relevance to clinical practice: Diabetes liaison nurses have been appointed at many hospitals to improve diabetes management of hospitalized patients. The specific nursing work assessment scale for diabetes liaison nurses is a validated tool that can be used to assess the special practices of diabetes liaison nurses.