A Measure of Barriers Toward Medical Disclosure Among Health Professionals in the United Arab Emirates

Background There has been a growing awareness that patients are subject to injuries that can be prevented as a direct consequence of health care. Error disclosure is an effective technique to restore the lost trust with the health care system. Objective The current study aimed to develop a valid and reliable scale to determine the factors facilitating the disclosure of health professionals in health organizations. Methods This study had a cross-sectional design that consisted of 722 responses (response rate of 68.3%) from 1 private and 1 public hospital in Sharjah, United Arab Emirates. The data collection tool included 23 items rated on a Likert scale ranging from 5, strongly agree, to 1, strongly disagree. The internal consistency was established through calculating the split-half reliability for part 1 (12 items), which had a Cronbach coefficient of 0.65, and part 2 (11 items), which had a Cronbach coefficient of 0.62. Scale validity was assessed with the Kaiser-Meyer-Olkin measure of sampling adequacy, which had a value of 0.62, and the Bartlett test of sphericity (approximated (2) = 13012.2, P = 0.0001) supported the factorability of the correlation matrix. The varimax rotation revealed 5 components that explained 77.8% of the total variance. Results The varimax rotation revealed 21 items loaded on the following 5 factors: fear of disclosure and provider image consequences (factor 1), apology (factor 2), organizational culture toward patient safety (factor 3), professional ethics and transparency (factor 4), as well as patient and provider education (factor 5). Conclusions The disclosure of medical mistakes requires preliminary considerations to effectively and compassionately disclose these events to patients. The validity and reliability of the results support the use of this scale at hospitals as part of the health care providers' disclosure processes.