2022, Vol.25, No.2

Korean Journal of Medical Ethics 2023 KCI Impact Factor : 1.21

pISSN : 2005-8284 / eISSN : 2234-3598
https://journal.kci.go.kr/medethics

Ethical, legal, and social implications (ELSI) research was introduced in the 1990s as part of an effort to carry out responsible research in human genetics and genomics. Since then it has become a common practice associated with large-scale research in the life sciences. This article argues that ELSI research that is suitable for Korea society should (a) focus on high-priority and specific issues, (b) relate directly to ongoing scientific research, and (c) be informed by a broad range of academic disciplines, including not only law and ethics, but also economics, anthropology and other areas of the humanities and social sciences. It is an essential task of ELSI researchers in Korea to create an environment in which top-down and bottom-up research can be combined to reflect the perspectives of variety of groups and perspectives. A further objective of ELSI research is to establish a research infrastructure to facilitate communication between researchers, the public, the government, and other stakeholders.

This study was conducted to evaluate the validity and reliability of the Korean version of Schwartz Center Compassionate Care Scale (K-SCCCS) in recent hospitalizations. Participants were 306 adults (15 – 64 years old), who had been hospitalized for more than 24 hours at general or tertiary hospital within the last 3 months. Internal consistency, stability, reliability, construct validity (ex-ploratory and confirmatory factor analysis), and criterion validity were evaluated. Using the Rasch model, the persons and items fit, distribution of item difficulty, and appropriateness of the rating scale were also investigated. The confirmatory factor analysis showed a reasonable fit (RMSEA=0.08, CFI=97, TLI=0.96). There were significant correlations between K-SCCCS and individualized care (0.70, p <.001), clinical compassion (0.67, p <.001) and subjective satisfaction with compas-sionate care (0.66, p <.001). Overall internal reliability (Cronbach’s alpha=0.97) and test-retest reliability (0.66) were good. All items and scales adjusted well to the model (fit indices range: 0.66~1.22) except for item 12. The K-SCCCS had satisfactory person separation reliability (0.97) and item separation reliability (0.93). There were no disordered thresholds in the 10-point rating scale. The K-SCCCS is a useful and reliable scale to assess compassionate care in Korean inpatient populations.