Measuring health status as an indicator of individual, family, and community health is a critical tool to use in reducing health disparities in populations. While hallmark health status measures exist for researchers and clinicians, cost, length, and interpretation of results can be problematic, particularly in practice settings with limited resources. The purpose of this study was to describe the reliability and validity of a brief self-reported health status instrument available in the public domain, the Health Status Questionnaire-12 (HSQ-12). Health status is conceptualized for this study as multifaceted, influenced by a dynamic interaction among health determinants (biology, behaviors, environment), unfolding over the life course of individuals, families, and communities. The study was conducted with a low income adult population (n=7793). The HSQ-12 contains eight scales measuring aspects of physical and mental health. The alpha coefficient for instrument reliability was 0.877. Construct validity using initial and confirmatory factor analysis revealed two factors explaining 67% of the variance; interpreted as super scales of physical and mental health, and obtained by summing the four scale items contained in each factor. Second order factor analysis isolated one overall factor explaining 82% of the variance, interpreted as a total health status score, obtained by summing all eight scale items. Discriminance between groups (those with and without disabilities) using t-tests showed the scale means differed significantly at p<.05 between those with and without disabilities for each of the eight scales, and Mann-Whitney U Test revealed the two super scales and the total scale had mean ranks that differed significantly at p<.001. Results demonstrate that the HSQ-12 provides a reliable, valid, low cost alternative to existing health status measures. Using the super and total scale scores provides nurses with health status measures that can serve to identify those populations at risk and experiencing health disparities.
Session #1223 - Graduate Student Poster Session
The 29th Annual MNRS Research Conference (April 1-4, 2005)