Objective: The aim of this study was to develop and validate a questionnaire for assessing HIV-infected patients' satisfaction with pharmaceutical care received in Nigerian HIV clinics.

Method: Questionnaire items were selected based on similar published studies and designed using a 5-point Likert response scale.  Face and content validity, feasibility, factorial validity, reliability and construct validity were evaluated.  The instrument's feasibility was assessed in a secondary health care facility (St. Charles Borromeo Hospital Onitsha) and validated in a tertiary health care facility (University of Nigeria Teaching Hospital Enugu).  Factor analysis used principal components and varimax rotation.  Reliability was established using internal consistency with Cronbach's alpha.  Convergent and discriminant validity were determined using Spearman's rho correlation.

Results: A self-administered 16-item questionnaire in 5-point Likert response scale format was developed.  Questionnaire evaluated cumulative experience of patients with comprehensive pharmaceutical care practice in pharmacies of HIV clinics.  80 questionnaires were collected for the pilot test while 400 questionnaires were retrieved for the validity test.  Factor analysis resulted in four factors: 'Interpersonal/Professional relationship with pharmacist', 'patient counselling', 'drug information' and 'managing therapy', with a cumulative variance of 56.7%.  Cronbach's alpha for the whole questionnaire was 0.85, and 0.81, 0.66, 0.67 and 0.72 for the four factors, respectively.  Four items used for convergent and discriminant validity showed convergence between the related items and variance between the unrelated items.

Conclusions: The questionnaire developed is a reliable and valid instrument for assessing patient satisfaction with pharmaceutical care in HIV clinics in Nigeria.  Further research is needed to expand the instrument's robustness.