Nurs Crit Care. 2025 Sep;30(5):e70129. doi: 10.1111/nicc.70129.
ABSTRACT
BACKGROUND: Peer support has demonstrated effectiveness in relieving parental stress and promoting the physical, mental and social well-being of both parents and their preterm infants, facilitating a smooth transition from the neonatal intensive care unit to home. Having a need assessment tool is helpful for accurately evaluating the parents’ actual multidimensional needs for peer support. However, there is no valid tool for specifically assessing the peer support needs of parents of preterm infants.
AIM: The aim of this study was to develop an instrument for assessing the peer support needs of parents of preterm infants and to assess its reliability and validity.
STUDY DESIGN: A mixed-methods design based on DeVellis’s instrument development procedure, which consists of development and evaluation stages, was used. In the development stage, a conceptual framework was determined through a literature review and in-depth interviews with parents of preterm infants. An item pool was generated based on the extracted peer support needs, and a 5-point Likert scale was used as the response format. Thirteen experts reviewed the initial items and evaluated the content validity. In the evaluation stage, item analysis, exploratory factor analysis (EFA), internal consistency and test-retest reliability were assessed by a cross-sectional survey of parents of preterm infants.
RESULTS: The final scale contained five dimensions and 39 items. Item analysis using critical ratios of items and the item-total correlation coefficients indicated that the items had high discrimination and relevance. The EFA indicated that the extracted five factors explained 81.79% of the common variance of peer support needs. Appropriate internal consistency and test-retest reliability indicated good reliability.
CONCLUSION: The Peer Support Needs Scale for Parents of Preterm Infants is a reliable and valid instrument for assessing the peer support needs of parents caring for preterm infants.
RELEVANCE TO CLINICAL PRACTICE: With its practical application in measuring a continuum of parents’ needs from the perspective of support recipients, this instrument could be a valuable tool for researchers and practitioners. Its measuring findings may be useful in designing targeted peer support interventions and matching suitable support providers.
PMID:40785540 | DOI:10.1111/nicc.70129
