Endocrine Abstracts

Aim: Self-monitoring of blood glucose has an important place in ensuring diabetes management. This study aims to develop a reliable instrument to assess blood glucose measurement knowledge in diabetic patients. The purpose of the scale is to assess blood glucose measurement knowledge in diabetic patients.

Method: The data were collected from 240 patients in the diabetes polyclinic of a training and research hospital between March and September 2022. The scale item pool was created using the data obtained from the literature review and expert opinions. A validity analysis was performed for construct, content, and convergent validity. Kuder-Richardson-20 and test-retest reliability were used to assess the reliability of the scale.

Results: Among the patients included in the study, 57.9% were female, and 91.3% were married. The duration of diabetes was 10.78±8.04 years; 79.6% had type 2 diabetes, and 37.1% used OAD+insulin. The researchers developed the final 3-point Likert-type “Blood Glucose Measurement Knowledge Scale (BGM-Knowledge Scale)” with 24 items. The scale content validity index was 0.91, and the convergent validity analysis result was 0.591 (P<0.01). The scale items were subjected to one-factor CFA to confirm the structure of the scale with factorial weights ranging between 0.532 and 0.991. Kuder-Richardson-20 of the total scale was 0.90. The Kuder-Richardson 20 of the total scale was 0.90, and the test-retest result showed that the scale did not change over time (ICC=0.947; P<0.01).

Conclusion: The BGM-Knowledge Scale is a reliable and valid measurement tool to measure the knowledge level of diabetic patients about blood glucose measurement.

Keywords: Blood Glucose Measurement, Instrument Development, Scale, Validity, Nursing.