Development of a Japanese Version of the Feeling Heard and Understood Scale: Reliability and Validity in Outpatients

The Feeling Heard and Understood (FHU) scale evaluates communication between patients and healthcare providers to measure patient-centered care from the patient's perspective. This study aimed to develop a Japanese version of the FHU (FHU-J). Three researchers translated the original scale, and cognitive interviews with 10 hospitalized patients ensured face validity. The survey items were back-translated and approved by the original authors. Two web-based surveys were conducted one week apart to assess the FHU-J's internal consistency, concurrent validity, and test-retest reliability that targeted adults hospitalized for over a week in the past year. The first and second surveys included 608 and 255 respondents, respectively (50.4% men; mean age: 57.0). Surgery was the primary reason for admission (48.1%). The Cronbach α for the FHU-J was .93, and the intraclass correlation coefficient between the 2 responses was 0.54. Cronbach α and correlation coefficients demonstrated sufficient validity of the FHU-J, whereas the intraclass correlation coefficient indicated moderate reliability.