A tool to measure perceptions of school nurse functions.

The purpose of this study was to develop a tool to measure adults' and adolescents' perceptions of school nurse function. Two major steps were involved in the formulation of the questionnaire, Perceptions of School Nurse Functions. The initial step involved the formation of the 71 items, a review by a panel of experts, and the administration of the questionnaire with a nomination format to ten adults and eight adolescents. Fourteen weak items were identified in the statistical analyses, deleted, and the remaining items were revised as needed for clarity and proper form. The revised questionnaire was administered to 135 adolescent drawn from two junior high schools. The questionnaire with the nomination format was administered to 24 parents drawn from the same schools. The results indicated the questionnaire measure perceptions but were in need of further refinement. The focus of further study should by on the use of the questionnaire in school districts were there is a school nurse in each school; the same size should be at least 600 adolescents; and emphasis should be placed on reliability, validity, and sources of between-group variance.