Development and preliminary psychometric evaluation of a nursing error tool in critical care units.

Abstract Objective This study was conducted to address the importance of identifying nursing errors in critical care units and the lack of appropriate tools for measuring them. This study aimed to develop and psychometrically evaluate a nursing error tool in critical care units. Design This was a psychometric validity study. Setting The study involved eight critical care units affiliated with Kurdistan University of Medical Sciences. Methods The research was conducted in two phases. In the first phase, data were gathered via interviews with nurses, and analyzed with conventional content analysis. The primary codes and subcategories were identified as tool items. In the second phase, the psychometric properties of the instrument, including face validity, content validity, construct validity, internal consistency, and reliability were investigated. Results In the first phase, 142 items were extracted; this number was reduced to 40 items after assessing qualitative content validity. Exploratory factor analysis identified five factors: medication error, task description error, executive error, procedural error, and safety error, which made up 88% of the total variance. The Cronbach’s alpha was 0.97. Conclusions The development of a validated nursing error tool is helpful in identifying the extent and typologies of nursing errors, and could aid in designing better prevention strategies in critical care units.