Development of an Instrument for Evaluating Nurses' Knowledge and Attitude Toward End-of-Life Care: End-of-Life Nursing Education ConsortiumJapan Core Quiz

This study aimed to develop a scale focusing on knowledge and attitudes toward palliative care and end-of-life care for nurses and to confirm the scale's validity and reliability. We conducted a self-administered questionnaire survey with 1745 nurses of 10 hospitals all over Japan. We also examined the test-retest reliability of items for 205 of the nurses, 2 weeks after the first survey was completed. We used item-response theory, factor analysis, and intraclass correlation coefficients. The response rate was 44.5% (n = 762). Ninety items in 9 domains about knowledge of palliative care and end-of-life care were selected by using item-response theory. For knowledge items, Kuder-Richardson-20 was 0.85, and intraclass correlation coefficient was 0.84 in all domains. Ten items in 3 domains about attitudes toward palliative care and end-of-life care were selected by using exploratory factor analysis. For attitude items, Cronbach's coefficient was .90, and intraclass correlation coefficient was 0.80 in all domains. The developed scale, named the End-of-Life Nursing Education ConsortiumJapan Core Quiz, has sufficient validity and reliability. This scale may contribute to assessing the effectiveness of the End-of-Life Nursing Education ConsortiumJapan Core Curriculum Nursing Education Program in Japan.