PSYCHOMETRIC ASSESSMENT OF A SHORT VERSION OF PRIMARY CARE ASSESSMENT TOOL (PCAT), EVALUATING A POPULATION OF ONE PREPAID OF ARGENTINA

Primary health care (PHC) plays a central role in the good functioning of the health system, offering the most efficient and equitable care for the needs of the population. In the implementation process of PHC, evaluation constitutes a key instrument for the continued improvement of care quality. The Primary Care Assessment Tools (PCAT) are one of the most compete instruments for evaluating PHC, with the advantage of getting information from different perspectives (professional, user, health center and health system perspectives). This instrument was developed in the United States and validated in Spanish in Argentina by Berra Silvina. The PCAT questionnaire is made up of 95 questions. Recently, a Brazilian research group validated an abbreviated form derived from the PCAT user questionnaire that is made up of 23 questions. The present study looks at the psychometric behavior of this abbreviated version in the population of a pre-paid medical plan in Argentina. The Confirmatory Factor Analysis technique was used to assess the validity of construct and Cronbach's alpha and Composite Reliability to assess reliability. Of the 366 selected patients, 315 surveys were obtained (response rate of 86%).The questionnaire presented acceptable validity and reliability, considering the general indicators of good fit in Confirmatory Factor Analysis in the population of the medical plan. Four items presented low factorial loading in the PHC construct. A Delphi method group was carried out so as to achieve a consensus-based interpretation of this issue. This abbreviated PCAT can be used to undertake rapid assessments in PHC.