Development of Items to Assess Patients’ Health Literacy Experiences at Hospitals for the Consumer Assessment of Healthcare Providers and Systems (CAHPS) Hospital Survey

BACKGROUND: The complexity of health information frequently exceeds patients' skills to understand and use it. Improvement in hospital communication has the potential to improve the quality of care. OBJECTIVE: To develop a set of items to supplement the Consumer Assessment of Healthcare Providers and Systems (CAHPS) Hospital Survey (HCAHPS) to assess how well hospitals communicate health information to inpatients. METHODS: We conducted an environmental scan and obtained input from stakeholders to identify domains and survey items, and cognitively tested the item set in English and Spanish. We administered the items to a random sample of adult hospital patients using mail and telephone data collection. We estimate item-scale correlations for hypothesized multi-item composites, internal consistency reliability for composites, correlations among composites, and regressed global rating of the hospital and a would you recommend the hospital items on HCAHPS existing core and the new composites to evaluate the unique contribution of each to these "bottom-line" measures. RESULTS: A total of 1013 surveys were obtained (55% response rate). With some exceptions, correlations between items and scales were consistent with the hypothesized item clusters. Three composites were identified: (1) communication about tests; (2) communication about how to care for self and medicines; and (3) communication about forms. CONCLUSIONS: This study provides support for the measurement properties of the HCAHPS Item Set for Addressing Health Literacy. It can serve as both a measure of whether healthcare providers in a hospital setting have communicated effectively with their patients and as a tool for quality improvement

Acute care · Business · Consistency (knowledge bases) · Family medicine · Health care · Health literacy · Literacy · MEDLINE · Patient satisfaction · Quality (philosophy) · Quality management · Rating scale · Scale (ratio) · Set (abstract data type) · Telephone interview · Computer Science · Health Literacy and Information Accessibility · Marketing · Medicine · Nursing · Patient Satisfaction in Healthcare · Patient-Provider Communication in Healthcare · Psychology

• Towards a Quality Care Climate Perspective

  Open Access•Seth Ayisi Addo, Reidar J Mykletun et al.•International Journal of…•2026

  Incluir item

• Patient Satisfaction Determinants of Inpatient Healthcare

  Open Access•Beata Gavurova, Jan Dvorsky et al.•International Journal of…•2021

  Incluir item

• Health literacy in Beijing

  Open Access•Daitao Zhang, Shuangsheng Wu et al.•BMC Public Health•2015

  Incluir item

• Shadow Coaching Improves Patient Experience With Care, But Gains Erode Later

  Denise D Quigley, Marc N Elliott et al.•Medical Care•2021

  Incluir item

• Derivation of New Readability Formulas (Automated Readability Index, Fog Count and Flesch Reading Ease Formula) for Navy Enlisted Personnel

  J Peter Kincaid, Jr Fishburne et al.•1975

  Incluir item

• Low Health Literacy and Health Outcomes

  Open Access•Nancy D Berkman, Stacey L Sheridan et al.•Annals of Internal Medicine•2011

  Incluir item

• Making survey results easy to report to consumers

  Jeanne Mcgee, David E Kanouse et al.•1999

  Incluir item

• Psychometric Properties of the CAHPSTM 1.0 Survey Measures

  Ron D Hays, James A Shaul et al.•Medical Care•1999

  Incluir item

• The Use of Cognitive Testing to Develop and Evaluate CAHPSTM 1.0 Core Survey Items

  Lauren Harris-Kojetin, Lauren D Harris-Kojetin et al.•Medical Care•1999

  Incluir item

• Making Survey Results Easy to Report to Consumers

  Jeanne Mcgee, David E Kanouse et al.•Medical Care•1999

  Incluir item

• Development and Evaluation of CAHPS® Survey Items Assessing How Well Healthcare Providers Address Health Literacy

  Open Access•Beverly Weidmer, Beverly A Weidmer et al.•Medical Care•2012

  Incluir item