Development and psychometric assessment of a novel survey to measure care coordination from the specialist's perspective

Abstract

Objective To develop an online survey of care coordination with primary care providers as experienced by medical specialists, evaluate its psychometric properties, and test its construct validity. Data Sources Physicians (N = 633) from 13 medical specialties across the Veterans Health Administration. Study Design We developed the survey based on prior work (literature review, specialist interviews) and by adapting existing measures and developing new items. Multitrait scaling analysis and confirmatory factor analysis were used to assess scale structure. We used multiple linear regression to examine the relationship of the final coordination scales to specialists’ overall experience of care coordination. Data Collection November 2016‐December 2016. Principal Findings Results suggest a 13‐item, four‐factor survey [Relationships (k = 4), Roles and Responsibilities (k = 4), Communication (k = 3), and Data Transfer (k = 2)] that measures the medical specialist experience of coordination with good internal consistency reliability, convergent validity, discriminant validity, and goodness of fit. Together, the four scales explained nearly 50 percent of the variance in specialists’ overall experience of care coordination. Conclusions The 13‐item Coordination of Specialty Care—Specialist Survey (CSC‐Specialist) is the first of its kind. It can be used alone or embedded in other surveys to measure four domains of care coordination as experienced by medical specialists.

Development and psychometric assessment of a survey to measure specialty care coordination as experienced by primary care providers

“…Our study has limitations. Our response rate of 24 percent is similar or better to that achieved in other online surveys of VA clinicians 10,45,46 and represents a similar demographic profile to that of respondents to another national VA survey of PCPs 47 but raises the possibility of nonresponse bias. It is possible, for example, that our respondents represent those who have particularly good or poor experiences of coordination.…”

“…To develop a conceptual framework for survey development, we previously used literature review, existing surveys, and interviews with PCPs and specialists to identify four key care coordination constructs: mutually respectful and collaborative relationships, clear roles and responsibilities, clear and timely communication, and timely and accurate data transfer 10 …”

“…For this reason, we are developing a family of three related questionnaires—one for each member of the specialty care triad. We previously published a 13‐item measure of care coordination from the specialist's perspective 10 . The patient measure is under development.…”

Spanish Validation of the User Reported Measure of Care Coordination Questionnaire for Older People with Complex, Chronic Conditions

“…This must be overcome and has to be considered a priority. Health care systems remain disjointed and processes vary among and between primary care sites and specialty sites [27]. Patients are often unclear about why they are being referred from primary care to a specialist, and what to do after specialist visits.…”

Spanish Validation of the “User Reported Measure of Care Coordination” Questionnaire for Older People with Complex, Chronic Conditions

“…This must be overcome and has to be considered a priority. Health care systems remain disjointed and processes vary among and between primary care sites and specialty sites [26]. Patients are often unclear about why they are being referred from primary care to a specialist, and what to do after specialist visits.…”