Razi Journal of Medical Sciences

Background: Considering this fact that in necessary conditions physicians should breaking bad NEWS to their patients and families, they have to obtain essential behavioral skills during their educations. That’s why these behavioral skills play important roles in definition of professionalism in World Health Organization while the most important aspect is its efficacy.

Methods: This is a descriptive analytic study which has been conducted in Iran to standardize the validity and reliability of Spike questionnaire about breaking bad NEWS to the patients. At first the questionnaire was translated from English to Persian and then it was coordinated with national scales and again translated into English to confirm its external validity. To evaluate its structural validity it was distributed among 100 medical residents and finally the data was analyzed with statistical software. The results were discussed by expert professions. Its reliability was also assessed by Cronbach's Alpha and also Test - retest methods and considering the results, the final questionnaire on this issue was designed.

Results: Due to our results, validity and reliability of the questionnaire was confirmed. Cronbach's Alpha test showed its internal solidarity more than 0.7 and ICC was measured as.903 that all confirmed the questionnaire reliability.

Conclusion: Spike questionnaire can be a valid and reliable method to evaluate the awareness of physicians in breaking bad NEWS to the patients and their family members. As not many studies have evaluated this issue it seems necessary to conduct a national educational program for all medical students in universities