Validation of nursing-sensitive outcomes in persons with spinal cord impairment.

Identification of nursing-sensitive patient outcomes in individuals with spinal cord impairment (SCI) is the first step in documenting the importance of nursing practice for this population. The aims of this descriptive study were to identify a comprehensive list of nursing-sensitive patient outcomes that SCI nurse's judge to be relevant to individuals with SCI and establish a framework for clinical validation of these outcomes in the future. Members of the American Association of Spinal Cord Injury Nurses (AASCIN) completed the Nursing Outcomes Classification (NOC) Relevance of Outcome Rating Questionnaire. Twelve outcome categories had a diagnostic content validity (DCV) score above 0.8, sixteen were between 0.6 and 0.79, and one was below 0.6. Of the 260 individual outcome items, 139 had a DCV score above 0.8 (12 were 0.9 or higher), 76 had a DCV score between 0.6 and 0.79, and 45 had a DCV score below 0.6.