Adaptation of the quality of oncology nursing care scale for patients undergoing cancer treatment in South Korea

We evaluated the reliability and validity of the Korean translation of the quality of oncology nursing care scale (K-QONCS) and verified its suitability as a tool to assess the quality of cancer patient care in Korea. To validate the content validity of the K-QONCS, five oncology nurse experts assessed the suitability of the adapted tools. Exploratory factor analysis (EFA) was used to assess construct, convergent, discriminant, and criterion validity. A survey of 235 adults aged > 18 years who had been diagnosed with cancer and were receiving treatment was conducted to validate the K-QONCS. The QONCS was translated and appropriately modified to reflect expert opinion, and its content validity was confirmed to be high through indicators such as item-level content validity index, scale-level content validity index using an averaging calculation (S-CVI/Ave), and S-CVI/universal agreement. Eight factors were derived by EFA; each factor reflected different aspects of quality of care. The scale exhibited convergent and discriminant validity, demonstrated by multitrait-multimethod matrix analysis and correlation analysis with the Nursing Satisfaction Scale. The Cronbach's alpha coefficient was 0.92, indicating high overall internal consistency. We demonstrated the reliability and feasibility of the K-QONCS. The K-QONCS may help oncology nurses to improve patient care experiences and outcomes as well as advance oncology nursing practices in South Korea.