Abdul Wahab Patimah, Mohd Yusoff Dariah, Abdul Kadir Azidah, Ali Siti Hawa, Lee Yeong Yeh, Kueh Yee Cheng
Department of Medical-Surgical Nursing, Kulliyyah of Nursing, International Islamic University Malaysia, Kuantan, Malaysia.
Nursing Programme, School of Health Sciences, Universiti Sains Malaysia, Kota Bharu, Malaysia.
PeerJ. 2020 Mar 3;8:e8581. doi: 10.7717/peerj.8581. eCollection 2020.
Chronic constipation is a common symptom among the elderly, and it may affect their quality of life (QoL). A lack of available research focused on the elderly means that this effect is not well understood. This study aimed to develop and validate a new scale (Elderly-Constipation Impact Scale (E-CIS)) to measure the impact of chronic constipation on QoL among the elderly.
A pool of items was generated from a qualitative study, literature reviews, and expert reviews. Exploratory factor analysis (EFA) was performed on the original 40 items of the E-CIS and followed by 27 items for confirmatory factor analysis (CFA). A total of 470 elderly people with chronic constipation were involved.
The mean age of the participants was 68.64 ± 6.57. Finally, only 22 items were indicated as appropriately representing the E-CIS, which were grouped into seven subscales: 'daily activities', 'treatment satisfaction', 'lack of control of bodily function', 'diet restriction', 'symptom intensity', 'anxiety' and 'preventive actions'. The scale was confirmed as valid (root mean square error of approximation (RMSEA) = 0.04, comparative fit index (CFI) = 0.961, Tucker-Lewis index (TLI) = 0.952 and chi-square/degree of freedom (chiSq/df) = 1.44) and reliable (Cronbach's alpha: 0.66-0.85, composite reliability (CR) = 0.699-0.851) to assess the impact of chronic constipation on the elderly's QoL.
The E-CIS is useful to measure the impact of chronic constipation on the elderly's QoL. A further test is needed to determine the validity and reliability of this scale in other elderly population.
慢性便秘是老年人常见的症状，可能会影响他们的生活质量（QoL）。缺乏针对老年人的现有研究意味着这种影响尚未得到充分理解。本研究旨在开发并验证一种新的量表（老年人便秘影响量表（E-CIS）），以测量慢性便秘对老年人生活质量的影响。
通过定性研究、文献综述和专家评审生成了一组条目。对E-CIS最初的40个条目进行探索性因子分析（EFA），随后对27个条目进行验证性因子分析（CFA）。总共纳入了470名患有慢性便秘的老年人。
参与者的平均年龄为68.64±6.57岁。最后，仅有22个条目被认为能够恰当地代表E-CIS，这些条目被分为七个子量表：“日常活动”、“治疗满意度”、“身体功能失控”、“饮食限制”、“症状强度”、“焦虑”和“预防措施”。该量表被确认为有效（近似误差均方根（RMSEA）=0.04，比较拟合指数（CFI）=0.961，塔克-刘易斯指数（TLI）=0.952，卡方/自由度（chiSq/df）=1.44）且可靠（克朗巴哈系数：0.66-0.85，组合信度（CR）=0.699-0.851），可用于评估慢性便秘对老年人生活质量的影响。
E-CIS对于测量慢性便秘对老年人生活质量的影响是有用的。需要进一步测试以确定该量表在其他老年人群中的有效性和可靠性。
