title: [Item selection for perinatal maternal health literacy scale].
abstract: OBJECTIVE
  To establish a more reliable and accurate scale of perinatal maternal health literacy during perinatal period by selecting items form existing scale.
  
  
  METHODS
  Two rounds of inquiry were performed by 14 experts on mother and children to evaluate the necessary and importance of 56 items by Delphi method, in which 50 items were retained. Th en we proceeded a cross-sectional survey in 350 woman who just gave birth 1-3 days before. 10% of them were selected to retest aft er 1 week. Based on these data, we used 6 different methods to select items and kept those that could pass by at least 3 different methods. The methods used in data analysis were Chi-square test, correlation coefficient method (2 kinds), factor analysis, Cronbach α coefficient method and the retest reliability method.
  
  
  RESULTS
  The Person correlation coefficient was 0.507 (P=0.004). By using the 6 statistical methods, we deleted 9 items through Chi-square test, 25 items through correlation coefficient method 1, 1 item through correlation coefficient method 2, 19 items through Cronbach α coefficient method, 8 items through factor analysis and 37 items through retest reliability method. In the end, 33 items were retained for the novel scale of maternal health literacy during perinatal period.
  
  
  CONCLUSIONS
  Simplified novel scale is acquired, which need to do large efforts before extensive use, such as large sample survey, reliability and validity test.
authors.affiliation: Department of Obstetrics and Gynecology, Th ird Xiangya Hospital, Central South University, Changsha 410013, China.
authors.forename: Chanyuan
authors.initials: C
authors.lastname: Dai
authors.forename: Jin
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: Yan
authors.forename: Linyong
authors.initials: L
authors.lastname: Xu
authors.forename: Xiao
authors.initials: X
authors.lastname: Qi
mesh_terms: D003430:Cross-Sectional Studies; D003697:Delphi Technique; D005163:Factor Analysis, Statistical; D005260:Female; D057220:Health Literacy; D006801:Humans; D009035:Mothers; D011181:Postnatal Care; D015203:Reproducibility of Results; D011795:Surveys and Questionnaires