Abstract:

Objective To develop the Readiness for Hospital Discharge Scale for Family of Children with Liver Transplantation，and to examine its reliability and validity. Methods Based on the concept analysis of discharge readiness，the item pool of the scale was constructed through literature analysis and semi-structured interview. Through expert consultation and pre-survey，the scale was formed preliminary. From January 2022 to January 2023，210 family caregivers of children with liver transplantation from a three grade A hospital in Zhejiang were recruited through convenient sampling method. General information questionnaire and Readiness for Hospital Discharge Scale for Family of Children with Liver Transplantation were issued to test the reliability and validity of the scale. Results The final version of the scale included five dimensions，namely personal status，home care knowledge，home care ability，disease coping and anticipatory support，with a total of 37 items. The Cronbach’s α coefficient of the whole scale was 0.923，with 0.683 to 0.900 for the dimensions. The split-half reliability coefficient was 0.847. The I-CVI ranged from 0.833 to 1.000，and the S-CVI/Ave was 0.982. The results of the exploratory factor analysis showed that a total of five common factors were extracted，with a cumulative variance contribution rate of 57.351%. Conclusion The Hospital Discharge Scale for Family of Children with Liver Transplantation holds good reliability and validity，which can be used as a reliable tool to assess the discharge readiness of family of children with liver transplantation.

Key words: Liver transplantation, Children, Family readiness for hospital discharge, Scale, Development, Reliability and validity