Background and Aim: Evaluation of hospital environments with reliable and valid tools is considered to be one of the essential prerequisites for continuous improvement of the hospital learning environment. The present study aimed to translate and evaluate psychometric properties of the short version of the PHEEM questionnaire among the residents of Tehran University of Medical Sciences residents.
Materials and Methods: This was a psychometric evaluation study. After translation and back translation, the questionnaire was provided to 18 experts. The content validity was qualitatively checked using the coefficients of content validity ratio (CVR), content validity index (CVI), and face validity. Then, the revised questionnaire was distributed among 20 residents. Face validity was evaluated by qualitative method and cognitive interview to check the questionnaire items in terms of difficulty level, appropriateness, and ambiguity. The test-retest method checked initial reliability by redistributing the questionnaire to the same residents with an interval of two weeks. In order to determine construct validity, the modified questionnaire was distributed among 548 medical residents from 24 specialized fields. The sample was selected using the convenience sampling method. Then the data were analyzed using exploratory and confirmatory factor analysis. Internal consistency was calculated using Cronbach’s alpha.
Results: The questionnaire’s content validity ratio (CVR) and content validity index (CVI) were 0.93 and 0.88, respectively. Based on the results of face validity, some minor changes were made to the vocabulary of most items, and item 12 was wholly changed. The ICC coefficient was more than 0.90 in all dimensions. In the exploratory factor analysis using the principal component method (PCA), the Kaiser-Meyer-Elkin value was 0.83. Bartlett’s test of sphericity was statistically significant (P<0.001), which confirms the functionality of the correlation matrix. The Cronbach’s alpha coefficient of the questionnaire was 0.83, which indicates the internal consistency of the questionnaire items.
Conclusions: According to the results, the PHEEM short-version questionnaire has good reliability and validity (face, content, and structure) among medical residents. Therefore, this measure can be used to evaluate residents’ perceptions regarding the quality of the educational environment of hospitals.
