Development and Content Validation of Person-Centered Care Instrument for Healthcare Providers

Despite increasing recognition of person-centered care (PCC) as a foundational principle in healthcare, existing evaluation tools often demonstrate profession-specific limitations and lack broad applicability across interdisciplinary professional contexts. This study aimed to develop and establish the content validity of the person-centered care instrument (PCCI), designed to assess the competence of healthcare providers in delivering PCC across diverse professions. A two-round modified Delphi technique was employed for face and content validation. Ten experts were consulted to assess an initial pool of 63 proposed items. Face validity explored the overall appropriateness and relevance of items, while content validity examined relevance ratings using a 9-point Likert scale and the item-level content validity index (I-CVI). Items with a median rating between 6 and 9 and an I-CVI of ≥ 0.70 were retained. Three items achieved universal agreement among the experts (I-CVI = 1.0). For the final 37-item PCCI, the overall scale-level content validity index and that based on universal agreement were 0.65 and 0.22, respectively. The developed PCCI provides a valid evaluation tool for assessing competence in delivering PCC within healthcare practice. This instrument can support quality improvement initiatives and promote a culture of empathy and respect in healthcare delivery.