title: Internal consistency of the readiness for interprofessional learning scale in German health care students and professionals.
abstract: BACKGROUND
  The implementation of a bachelor degree in "Interprofessional Health Care" at the University of Heidelberg, Germany has fostered the need to evaluate the impact of this innovative programme. The Readiness for Interprofessional Learning Scale (RIPLS) was developed by Parsell and Bligh (1999) to assess student's attitudes towards interprofessional education. The RIPLS consists of 19 items and four subscales were identified by McFadyen (J Interprof Care19:595-603, 2005): "teamwork and collaboration", "negative professional identity", "positive professional identity" and "roles and responsibilities". The RIPLS has been translated into a number of languages and used in a variety of different educational settings. A German version of the RIPLS was not available. Aim of the study was the translation of the RIPLS into German and testing of internal consistency.
  
  
  METHODS
  The RIPLS was translated to German according to international guidelines and its psychometric properties were assessed in two online surveys with two different samples a) health care graduates and b) health care students. Descriptive analysis (mean, SD, corrected item-total correlation) of the Readiness for Interprofessional Learning Scale - German (RIPLS-D) was performed for item characteristics and Cronbach's Alpha was calculated for internal consistency of overall and subscales of the RIPLS-D.
  
  
  RESULTS
  Each sample consisted of 76 datasets. Reliability for the RIPLS-D overall scale was 0.83 in both samples. The subscales displayed internal consistency between 0.42 and 0.88. Corrected item-total correlation showed low values in two subscales in the sample of graduates.
  
  
  CONCLUSIONS
  While the overall RIPLS-D scale is reliable, several subscales showed low values and should be used with caution to measure readiness for interprofessional learning in the German health care context. Internal consistency of the instrument does not seem to be given in health care professionals at different stages of their professional career. In particular the sub-scale "roles and responsibilities" was problematic. For these reasons, the RIPLS-D cannot be recommended for use to assess this concept.
authors.affiliation: Department of General Practice and Health Services Research, University Hospital Heidelberg, Vossstrasse 2, 69115 Heidelberg, Germany. cornelia.mahler@med.uni-heidelberg.de.
authors.forename: Cornelia
authors.initials: C
authors.lastname: Mahler
authors.forename: Justine
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: Rochon
authors.forename: Sven
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Karstens
authors.forename: Joachim
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: Szecsenyi
authors.forename: Katja
authors.initials: K
authors.lastname: Hermann
mesh_terms: D000328:Adult; D001291:Attitude of Health Personnel; D003299:Cooperative Behavior; D004506:Education, Nursing / Q000592:standards; D004521:Educational Measurement / Q000379:methods*; D005260:Female; D005858:Germany; D006281:Health Occupations / Q000193:education* / Q000592:standards; D006801:Humans; D007400:Interprofessional Relations; D008297:Male; D010348:Patient Care Team; D015203:Reproducibility of Results; D013336:Students, Health Occupations; D011795:Surveys and Questionnaires; D055815:Young Adult