ABSTRACT
Background
The current gap in access to palliative care requires the expansion of palliative
care services worldwide. There is little information about the structural components
required by palliative care services to provide adequate end-of-life care. No specific
tools have been developed to assess the structural quality of these services.
Aim
To develop and validate a tool to assess the structural quality of palliative care
services.
Design and setting
A scoping review of literature was performed to identify structural quality indicators
of palliative care services. National experts participated in a two-round Delphi method
to reach consensus regarding the importance and measurement feasibility of each proposed
indicator. Consensus was reached for each indicator if 60% or more considered them
both important and feasible. The selected indicators were tested among Chilean palliative
care services to assess instrument psychometric characteristics.
Results
31 indicators were identified. 35 experts participated in a two-round Delphi survey.
21 indicators reached consensus and were included in the Structural Quality of Palliative
Care Services tool (SQPCS-21). This instrument was applied to 201 out of 250 palliative
care services in Chile. Achievement for each indicator varied between 8% and 96% (mean
52%). The total SQPCS-21 score varied between 3 and 21 points (mean 11 points).
Conclusion
The SQPCS-21 tool to assess structural quality of palliative care services, has good
content and construct validity and its application provides information about institutions
at the individual and aggregated level. This tool can provide guidance to monitor
the structural quality of palliative care worldwide.
Keywords
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Article info
Publication history
Accepted:
January 8,
2023
Publication stage
In Press Journal Pre-ProofIdentification
Copyright
© 2023 Published by Elsevier Inc. on behalf of American Academy of Hospice and Palliative Medicine.
