Development of a Scale for the Coordination Function of Family Physicians Regarding Antenatal Care

Aim: The aim of this study was to develop a scale to measure the level of coordination of antenatal care by primary care services in Turkey and to evaluate the reliability and validity of this scale. Methods: The scale was developed in four steps. The first three steps were generating an item pool and conducting an expert panel and pilot study. In the last step, the scale was administered to 178 women living in three suburbs of Izmir, Turkey, who had given birth between November 2013 and February 2014. The split-half and Cronbach’s alpha tests were applied to assess internal consistency. Exploratory factor analysis was used to investigate construct validity. Results: Six factors emerged from the factor analysis: accessibility and comprehensiveness of FHW services, accessibility and comprehensiveness of FP services, coordination of care by FPs, coordination of care by FHWs, FPs as first point of contact and recognising determinants of health. The factors explained 65.7% of the total variance. The Split-Half and Cronbach’s alpha reliability coefficients were 0.7 and 0.9 respectively. Conclusion: The scale developed in this study is a specific tool aimed at evaluating the coordination of antenatal care and has successful psychometric features.