Development and psychometric testing of The Care in Obstetrics: Measure for Testing Satisfaction (COMFORTS) scale.

This paper describes the development and psychometric assessment of a scale to measure satisfaction with intrapartum and postpartum care in hospital: The Care in Obstetrics: A Measure For Testing Satisfaction (COMFORTS) scale. A sample of 415 participants completed the 40-item scale. Cronbach's alpha for the scale was .95. Evaluation of construct validity through principal components factor analysis with varimax rotation yielded six subscales: confidence in newborn care, postpartum nursing care, provision of choice, the physical environment, respect for privacy, and labor/delivery nursing care. The COMFORTS scale was able to discriminate between multiparous versus primiparous women, and between women cared for in single room maternity care versus in separate labor/delivery and postpartum rooms. Pending further validation, the COMFORTS scale has potential to measure women's satisfaction with childbirth care and contribute to an assessment of the quality of care provided. Copyright 2006 Wiley Periodicals, Inc.