OBJECTIVES: There have been no consistent reliable and valid tool for examining the psychosocial problems for the patients with mental disorders in Korea. The purpose of the present study is to develop a scale that examine the psychosocial problems for the patients with mental disorders and to test its reliability and validity. METHODS: To identify the psychosocial problems for 1,100 patients with mental disorders were selected in university hospitals and professional training institutes. And the items of the psychosocial problems were taken from them and divided them into individual and environmental categories. The representative items were established among these items of psychosocial problems and a questionnaire for a pilot study was made based on the representative items. The pilot study was done for 306 patients with mental disorders using the questionnaire to investigate reliability of the questionnaire. After the pilot study items and format of the questionnaire were revised and complemented. The revised questionnaire was given to 600 patients with mental disorders to test its validity and reliability and new scale for psychosocial problems was developed. RESULTS: At the pilot study, which was performed with 1,100 patients, 3,200 items of psychosocial problems of 205 types were selected. Among these items 78 representative psychosocial problems items were withdrawn. Fifty-eight psychosocial problem items were finally set for the questionnaire after discussing them with the expert groups and examining its content reliability. Forty-seven psychosocial problems items were finally selected and given to 306 subjects at the pilot study. At the main study in which 600 subjects were tested inner-reliability. Correlation between items and scale was relevant and correlation coefficient between test and retest was high. The finally developed psychosocial problems testing scales were consisted of 46 testing items into 9 areas. CONCLUSION: The Psychosocial Problems Assessment Scale, which were developed at this study is proved to be valid and reliable and it will be able to be used to examine overall psychosocial problems for the patients with mental disorders in Korea.
Academies and Institutes ; Complement System Proteins ; Hospitals, University ; Humans ; Korea ; Mental Disorders ; Pilot Projects ; Surveys and Questionnaires ; Reproducibility of Results ; Weights and Measures