Development and Validation of the Family and Community Nursing Advanced Practice Scale

Aim: To develop and test a Family and Community Nursing-Advanced Practice Scale.

Design: A cross-sectional and methodological scale validation design, following classical test theory.

Methods: Three phases, the first of which involved scale development, including item generation. Phase two assessed the content validity index. The third phase involved a cross-sectional survey to establish construct validity, content validity, internal consistency reliability, and exploratory factor analysis.

Results: The Family and Community Nursing Advanced Practice Scale has good construct validity, with the final scale consisting of 5 domains and 27 items. This was confirmed by both the exploratory and confirmatory factor analysis. The Cronbach's Alpha is very good, suggesting that the scale is reliable. When comparing family practice advanced practice nurses with those working in the community, the results show that scores are similar except for clinical reasoning and health promotion, which consistently showed statistically significant higher scores among the family practice nurses. While community nurses scored higher on items in the leading practice domain reflecting their role in a wider team of nurses.

Conclusion: This study developed and psychometrically tested the Family and Community Nursing-Advanced Practice Scale. The scale has good reliability, and analysis of the construct validity reveals five domains of advanced practice among this practitioner group.

Implications for the profession: The study suggests that advanced practice nurses working in community roles perform similar activities to those working in family practice in the United Kingdom. However, activity related to research was less evident.

Impact: The study examined the scope of the advanced practice nurse role in family and community nursing. The study illustrated practice across five domains: clinical care, leading practice, clinical reasoning, health promotion, and ethics. The family practice and wider community roles were largely homogenous, with only two items showing a statistically significant difference in scores.

Reporting method: STROBE guidelines for cross-sectional studies.

Patient or public contribution: No patient or public contribution.