Pediatric tele-coaching fidelity evaluation: Feasibility, perceived satisfaction and usefulness of a new measure.
Tatiana Ogourtsova, Annette Majnemer, Amelie Brown and 4 others
PMID 36896250WHAT IT FOUND
A new checklist helped track how well coaches stuck to a tele-health program for families waiting for child development services.
All four coaches met the 85% fidelity target within the first few sessions, and the coaches found the tool useful for spotting areas to improve.
Key findings
01The tool successfully tracked coaching fidelity, with all coaches meeting the 85% threshold during the pilot.
02Coaches reported that the tool helped them identify specific areas for skill improvement and validated their alignment with the program goals.
03Audio recording malfunctions prevented the assessment of 13 out of 152 coaching sessions.
STILL TO COME
How it was doneWhat they foundWhat it means for OTs
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What it does not show
The sample size was very small (4 coaches, 11 parents), making it a pilot feasibility study rather than a test of the tool's accuracy. The same person (the Lead Coach) who trained and supervised the coaches also rated their fidelity, which introduces potential bias. The study did not measure the psychometric properties of the CO-FIDEL tool (e.g., reliability or validity). Audio recording failures resulted in missing data for 13 sessions.
Declared interests
The study was funded by the Canadian Institutes of Health Research and CHILD-BRIGHT. The authors declared no specific conflicts of interest in the provided text.
The easy way to misread this
Do not assume the CO-FIDEL tool is a validated, reliable measure of coaching quality. It was only tested on four coaches by their own supervisor, and its psychometric properties were not evaluated. The high fidelity scores may reflect a ceiling effect rather than true excellence, as coaches reported the tool did not capture subtle areas for improvement.