A Swedish version of the Consultation and Relational Empathy (CARE) measure

OBJECTIVE A validated measure to gather patient feedback on physicians' empathy is not available in Swedish. The objective for this study was to examine the psychometric characteristics of a Swedish version of the Consultation and Relational Empathy (CARE) measure (widely used in English). DESIGN, SETTING AND PATIENTS The CARE measure was translated into Swedish and tested on 554 unselected patients visiting physicians in two primary care clinics in northwestern Stockholm, Sweden. MAIN OUTCOME MEASURES Adequate translation, as well as reliability and validity of the Swedish CARE measure. RESULTS The Swedish CARE measure seemed to demonstrate high acceptability and face validity when consulting a physician. The mean CARE score 41.5 (SD 8.9) over all 10 item was not significantly influenced by seasonality, age or gender. Scores were somewhat negatively distributed, but corrected item-total correlations were high (0.86-0.91) suggesting homogeneity. Internal reliability was very high (Cronbach's alpha 0.975). Factor analysis implied a one-dimensional structure with factor loadings between 0.89 and 0.93. CONCLUSIONS The Swedish CARE measure appears to be psychometrically valid and reliable enough in physicians.