Validity and reliability of self reported workplace exposure assessment scale (WEAS) among health workers

Introduction
Aim: To evaluate the validity and reliability of self reported workplace exposure assessment scale (WEAS) that can be used among health workers.

Methods
Method: This study was conducted among nurses, midwives and health technicians working at 5 different hospitals of city of Manisa which is located at the west part of Turkey during May 2011. A self reported WEAS was applied consisting of 11 items. In addition a scale assessing job stress, job satisfaction, and quality of life and a questionnaire evaluating the existence of chronic diseases was applied.
Cronbach alpha values were used for reliability and confirmatory factor analysis was applied with Lisrel 8.54 to assess construct validity, and t test used to assess discriminant validity. 

Results
Results: Among participants; 83.8% were female, 78.3% were married, 78.2% had a child, 82% had a higher education degree, and mean age was 35.3±6.6. Mean exposure scores of physical, radiation-chemical- biologic, ergonomic, violence and total were 2.9±0.9, 3.2±1.1, 4.0±0.9, 2.5±0.8 ve 3.2±0.6 respectively.
Internal consistency coefficient was 0.75 in WEAS. The results of confirmatory factor analysis were checked and correlations of all items with error variances and scale were found at acceptable level. RMSEA=0.10, CFI=0.87, GFI=0.92, Std.RMR=0.06 was found according to summary results of the analysis.
Scale was negatively correlated with social support, job satisfaction and quality of life.
When discriminant validity was examined, mean values were higher among individuals who had a disease or a problem, or had an experience of sharps and needle stick injuries compared to ones who did not.

Discussion
Conclusion: The workplace exposure assessment scale has a medium level psycometric property. Scale has a discriminant property for health results.