PURPOSE
The purpose of this study was to validate the scale of Informatics Competencies for Nurses developed by Staggers, Gassert & Curran(2001) among Korean nurses. METHODS: The subjects of this study were 58 RN-BSN students and 314 nurses in Busan, Ulsan and Kyoungnam province. Data were collected by questionnaires from June to August, 2006 and from October, 2006 to August, 2007 and were analyzed by Principal Component Analysis for construct validity and Cronbach's alpha coefficient for reliability. RESULTS: A factor analysis was conducted and 30 items that had a factor loading more than .40 were extracted. The explained variance from 5 factors was 55.33% of the total variance. The factors were named 'basic computer usage', 'medical informatics-related software usage', 'computer related information management', 'perception of informatics', and 'information search using internet'. The first factor consisted 10 items which explained 29.89% of the total variance and the second factor contained 7 items. The Cronbach's alpha coefficient was .91 among the 30 items. CONCLUSION: This scale, Informatics Competencies for Nurses, was proved as a proper instrument to apply to Korean nurses.
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