Empowering Nurse Health Education: Linguistic and Cultural Validation of the Nurse Health Education Competence Instrument (NHECI) in the Italian Context.

Background: Nurses worldwide are acknowledged for their role in health education across various settings. However, doubts often arise regarding their competence in this domain. This study aims to validate the Nurse Health Education Competence Instrument (NHECI) linguistically and culturally in the Italian context.

Methods: Following Beaton et al.'s (2000) guidelines, we conducted cross-cultural adaptation to develop the Italian version of the questionnaire.

Results: The Italian version demonstrates a good internal consistency and stability, making it suitable for assessing nursing students during clinical internships and practicing nurses. The availability of Italian tools promotes healthcare research, ensuring patient-centric care.

Conclusions: The validity and reliability of the Italian version of the instrument for assessing health education competencies, essential for self-assessment among health education nurses, are established.