Evaluation of Chinese version of the eHealth Literacy Scale

Objective To evaluate the measurement index of the Chinese version of the eHealth Literacy Scale (eHEALS) . Methods By convenience sampling, 160 inpatients in Department of Respiratory in a Class III Grade A hospital of Beijing were selected from April to May of 2018 and surveyed by self-designed questionnaire and eHEALS. The feasibility, reliability and validity of the scale was evaluated. Results Totally 155 valid questionnaires from eHEALS were collected with an effective recovery rate of 97%. Cronbach's α coefficient was 0.963 and retest reliability coefficient r was 0.984 (P<0.001) . One common factor was extracted by exploratory factor analysis, and the cumulative contribution rate of variance was 76.675%. Confirmative factor analysis showed that the fitting indexes of theoretical models of 1 latent variable and 8 items were satisfactory (GFI=0.808, CFI=0.911, RMSEA=0.202) . Conclusions The Chinese version of eHEALS has good reliability and validity and can be used to measure the eHealth literacy of patients. Key words: Health literacy; EHealth literacy; Scale; Reliability and validity