Abstract
Background: Without reliable evaluation tools, ensuring engagement quality, evaluating engagement results, adopting organizational learning, and proving commitment to public funds is difficult. The PPEET was designed to assess and improve excellence in patient and public engagement (PPE) initiatives across various health system organizations. Since language significantly affects the psychometric properties of research instruments, validated versions of these instruments are crucial. This study will be the first to validate the translation of PPEET into Arabic to track its impact on the healthcare systems of Lebanon and other Arabic-speaking countries.
Methods: This is a mixed method qualitative and quantitative cross-sectional validity and reliability study. We translated the four surveys into Arabic using the ‘forward and backward translation’ method. We tested the validity by interviewing 10 bilingual healthcare experts. The internal consistency reliability was measured with Cronbach’s alpha and correlation coefficient analysis.
Results: Healthcare experts, who were consulted for the face validity of the translated PPEET, had an average age of 34.7 ± 7.9 years with mean years of work experience of 8.9 ± 6.9. the majority were females and held post-graduate degrees. Professionals reported the average clarity percentage for all translated surveys as 96.42%. Participants suggested minor modifications to the final translated version that resulted from the face validity. Cronbach’s alpha coefficients for Participants’ questionnaire module A, Participants’ questionnaire module B, Project, and organization questionnaire, were 0.788, 0.891, 0.946, and 0.894, respectively. Only the Final thoughts of participants’ questionnaire module A showed poor internal consistency due to small number of participants.
Conclusion: This study demonstrates that the Arabic version of the PPEET is a valid and reliable tool. A large-scale sample would be beneficial for further analysis.