HEDS is part of the School of Health and Related Research (ScHARR) at the University of Sheffield. We undertake research, teaching, training and consultancy on all aspects of health related decision science, with a particular emphasis on health economics, HTA and evidence synthesis.

Tuesday 10 March 2020

ScHARR Short Course - The Application of Psychometrics for Measuring Health Outcomes and Quality of Life

The Application of Psychometrics for Measuring Health Outcomes and Quality of Life - 2 part course (can be done together or individually)

Part 1: 2-day course - Mon 1st - Tues 2nd June 2020

Part 2: 3-day course - Weds 3rd - Fri 5th June 2020



Part 1: The aim of this 2 day course is to provide participants with an introduction to psychometrics as applied to health. It will cover the core psychometric and statistical methods used in scale construction and the development of multi-item patient-reported outcome measures (PROMs). Sessions will be delivered by external staff Professor Jakob Bue Bjorner - Optum Patient Insights and Georgina Jones - Leeds becket University, who have an international reputation in psychometric methods and questionnaire development, analysis and interpretation and ScHARR Staff Anju Keetharuth. The course will be interactive and practical. Sessions will be delivered using lectures and individual and small group practical exercises using real world examples.

By the end of this course participants should be able to:
Identify the key stages involved in scale construction and development
Understand the qualitative process involved in the development of a PROM and item generation
Describe the different ways of scoring and scaling a PROM and the theory underpinning these
Understand exploratory (EFA) and confirmatory (CFA) factor analysis and be able to carry out EFA using SPSS
Understand what is meant by reliability, validity, and responsiveness and be able to analyse and interpret these using SPSS
Explore the above concepts using datasets from a range of existing disease-specific and generic PROMs
Be aware of the use of different software other than SPSS where applicable.

Part 2: The aim of this 3 day course is to provide participants with an introduction to advanced psychometric models in analysis of multi-item patient-reported outcome measures (PROMs). The course will cover confirmatory factor analytic methods for categorical data, Rasch models, and other items response theory (IRT) models. Sessions will be delivered by external staff Jakob Bue Bjorner - Optum Patient Insights, who has an international reputation in advanced psychometric methods and ScHARR Staff Anju Kaeetharuth. The course will be interactive and practical. Sessions will be delivered using lectures and individual and small group practical exercises using real world examples.

By the end of this course participants should be able to:

Perform item-level confirmatory factor analysis (CFA) of PROMs using Mplus software
Understand the assumptions of CFA models, evaluate model fit, and revise the model
Understand the similarities and differences between CFA models, Rasch models and other IRT models
Perform IRT analyses using the Mplus software
Understand the assumptions of Rasch and IRT models and the principles for testing the models
Use results from IRT analyses to develop or select the optimal PROM for a particular research purpose
Be aware of the use of other software for CFA, Rasch and IRT analyses.

Early bird booking rate for these courses will close 1st April 2020. Standard booking will close 21st May 2020

Link to further information on Part 1 of the course https://www.sheffield.ac.uk/scharr/shortcourseunit/psychometrics-part1

Link to further information on Part 2 of the course https://www.sheffield.ac.uk/scharr/shortcourseunit/psychometrics-part2