Validation of a Comprehensive Patient Experience Survey for Addiction and Mental Health that was Co-designed with Service Users

A rigorous survey development process was undertaken to design and test a novel, comprehensive patient experience measure that can be used across the full continuum of addiction and mental health programs. Service users were involved in all aspects of the measure’s development, including the selection of items, pre-testing, naming of the scales, and interpretation of the results. Survey data was collected from 1222 patients in treatment in a variety of service settings across Alberta, Canada (89% outpatients; 60% female). An exploratory factor analysis identified five subscales—patient-centred care, treatment effectiveness, staff behaviour, availability and coordination of care, and communication. The subscales had high internal reliability (Cronbach’s alpha = 0.77 to 0.85) and test–retest reliability ranged from 0.53 to 0.82 across the five scales. Scores on the new instrument were correlated with treatment outcomes. The assessment of patient experience should be integrated into a continuous, sustainable quality improvement process to be truly effective.