Development of an instrument to measure the attitudes of non Muslim health care providers toward the Muslims

Due to an increased population of Muslims in the United States, health care providers are challenged to consider the aspect of culture when providing care to a Muslim. The conflict of values between the health care provider and the patient may cause tension. A review of literature revealed a lack of instruments to measure the attitudes of non Muslim health care providers toward Muslims. This study was conducted to establish reliability of an attitude instrument designed to measure attitude of non Muslim health care providers toward Muslims. The instrument consisted of 24 statements on the attitude scale and eight statements on the contact inventory. An expert panel of six Muslims and non Muslim health care providers reviewed the statements and the investigator changed the statements on the questionnaire as recommended. Copies of the instrument were distributed to a convenience sample of 46 health care providers in a north Texas teaching hospital. Twenty-four participants responded to the questionnaires on two different occasions for a test-retest reliability measurement. A Cronbach's alpha coefficient was computed for the attitude scale using the first set of responses. The alpha value was.26. After reviewing the statements, 9 of the 24 statements with negative alpha were deleted which then changed the alpha value to.83. The test-retest result on the attitude scale with 24 statements was.79 and on the remaining 15 statements was.84. Further studies are needed to further explore the reliability of this attitude instrument.