Development and psychometric evaluation of the Ostomy Adjustment Inventory-23.
OBJECTIVE
This article describes the development of the Ostomy Adjustment Inventory-23 (OAI-23), a self-report, multidimensional scale designed to assess psychosocial adjustment in patients with ostomy.


METHODS
Five hundred seventy persons with a colostomy, ileostomy, or urostomy, who were randomly selected from 3 national databases, provided assessable data.


RESULTS
The results indicate that the OAI-23 is reliable (the Cronbach alpha = .93, split-half = 0.91, and test-retest (r) = 0.83) and valid, correlating positively with Felton's Acceptance of Illness Scale (r = 0.72) and confirming expected improvements in adjustment consistent with increasing time since surgery (F 5,531 = 5.22, P < .001). Four factors (eigenvalue >or= 1) that accounted for 55.4% of the total variance emerged from factor analysis.


CONCLUSIONS
The OAI-23 is a valid and reliable measure of psychosocial adjustment that will be of interest to both researchers investigating life after stoma surgery and clinicians making objective assessments of their patients' progress.
Simmons
Kingsley L
KL
University of Hertfordshire, Hillside House, College Lane, Hatfield, Hertfordshire, United Kingdom. k.simmons@herts.ac.uk
Smith
Jane A
JA
Maekawa
Atsuko
A
D003125:Colostomy / Q000523:psychology; D005500:Follow-Up Studies; D006801:Humans; D007081:Ileostomy / Q000523:psychology; D010030:Ostomy / Q000451:nursing* / Q000523:psychology*; D010342:Patient Acceptance of Health Care; D010555:Personality Inventory; D011594:Psychometrics; D015203:Reproducibility of Results; D012917:Social Adjustment; D013997:Time Factors; D014547:Urinary Diversion / Q000523:psychology