Objective: A scale for evaluating the protective motivation of patients who had suffered a stroke was developed to preliminarily verify the reliability of the scale and provide scientific measurement tools for clinical professionals.
Methods: A descriptive research design method was adopted. First, an initial draft of the questionnaire was formed by conducting a literature review supplemented by semi-structured interviews and modified using the Delphi method. A total of 287 patients who had suffered a stroke were selected for the formal survey using the convenience sampling method. Further item screening was performed using an item analysis and an exploratory factor analysis, and reliability testing was also performed.
Results: The scale consisted of 34 entries in the following 6 dimensions: severity, susceptibility, internal and external rewards, response efficacy, response cost and self-efficacy. The overall Cronbach’s alpha coefficient was 0.935, with correlation coefficients between dimensions and total scale scores ranging from 0.604 to 0.805 (P < 0.05) and correlation coefficients between dimensions ranging from 0.154 to 0.537 (P < 0.05).
Conclusion: The protective motivation scale prepared in this study was tested and had good reliability, so this scale can be used as a scientific tool to evaluate the implementation of secondary prevention strategies for protective motivation of patients who have suffered a stroke.
Keywords: stroke, protection motivation, health belief