Introduction and Objective: Youth receiving BFST for diabetes experienced improved diabetes self-management, parent-adolescent communication, and HbA1c. The BFST Skills Inventory (BFST-SI) was developed to assess intervention fidelity and family skills. While this measure has been used in numerous intervention studies for youth with diabetes, it has yet to be validated. This study aimed to examine the psychometric properties of the BFST-SI in youth participating in Novel Interventions in Children’s Health Care (NICH), a health equity intervention for youth with diabetes experiencing high social needs, medical risks, and healthcare costs.Methods: Youth participating in NICH at 3 academic medical centers completed the BFST-SI (N=127) and the Diabetes Strengths and Resilience Measure (DSTAR; N=48). The 20 BFST-SI items were examined using exploratory factor analysis with maximum likelihood extraction and direct oblimin rotation. Items with low item-to-total correlations and factor loadings (<0.3) were removed.Results: Youth with complete demographic data had a mean age of 15.4+1.9 years and mean HbA1c of 11.9+2.1%, with 96% on Medicaid. Fifteen items were retained and loaded onto 3 factors. Cronbach’s α was reliable for the total scale (α=.90) and each factor (α=.82-.89), which we labeled Family Problem Solving (6 items), Challenging Family Patterns (4 items), and Family Respect and Collaboration (5 items). BFST-SI total scores were correlated with DSTAR scores (r=.47, p<.01).Conclusion: The BFST-SI is a psychometrically sound measure used to assess BFST-D fidelity and family skill outcomes. This study adds to the extant literature demonstrating that family communication and problem-solving are critical skills for families of youth with diabetes. Screening for BFST skills will help identify families needing additional communication intervention and aid in treatment development and evaluation for youth with diabetes and their families.
K.A. Torres: None. J. Shapiro: None. F.S. Richey: None. D. Naranjo: Consultant; Sanofi. A. Reed: None. J.C. Wong: Research Support; Abbott, Dexcom, Inc., Tandem Diabetes Care, Inc. M. Gonzales Granados: None. M.E. Hilliard: None. M.A. Harris: None. D.V. Wagner: None.
The Leona M. and Harry B. Helmsley Charitable Trust
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