Instruments to Assess Family Focused Care in Nursing Clinical Practice: A Systematic Review of Psychometric Properties.
Bilal Benbelkheir, Ana Canga-Armayor, Cristina Alfaro-Diaz and 4 others
PMID 40556422WHAT IT FOUND
The Family Nursing Practice Scale, Iceland Family Perceived Support Questionnaire, and Perception of Family Centred Care Staff and Parents questionnaire are the strongest tools for assessing family-focused care.
No instrument is perfect; selection depends on whether you need staff or family perspectives.
Key findings
01The Family Nursing Practice Scale, Iceland Family Perceived Support Questionnaire, and Perception of Family Centred Care Staff and Parents questionnaire received the highest quality ratings and are considered the most suitable measures for clinical practice.
02Most existing instruments focus exclusively on the paediatric population, with only two tools validated for use with both children and adults.
03The Perception of Family Centred Care Staff and Parents questionnaire is one of only two instruments that captures perspectives from both healthcare professionals and families.
STILL TO COME
How it was doneWhat they foundWhat it means for RNs
Read the rest of this summary
You get three full summaries a month, free, and we do not ask for a card. Search, the TL;DRs and your library stay unlimited either way.
What it does not show
None of the included studies explicitly followed COSMIN guidelines during their original development or validation, which may affect the comparability of the results. Grey literature was excluded, so potentially relevant instruments reported in theses or conference abstracts were not included. There is a possibility of publication bias, where validation studies with negative results were not published. Most instruments were developed and tested in paediatric populations, limiting evidence for adult nursing settings.
Declared interests
The authors declared no conflicts of interest. The work was funded by Asociación de Amigos de la Universidad de Navarra and Banco Santander.
The easy way to misread this
Do not assume the highest-rated instruments are perfect for every context. The review notes that no instrument is ideal, and selection must depend on the specific population (adult vs. paediatric) and the perspective needed (staff vs. family). Applying a paediatric-validated tool to adult care without further validation may yield inaccurate assessments of family-focused care.