The Delphi Technique as a Method to Obtain Consensus in Health Care Education Research

Abstract

The Delphi technique is a widely used and accepted method to obtain consensus among the experts. This technique uses a judgement to prove the accuracy of the content item when evaluating instrument. The objective of this study is to discuss the process of the three rounds Delphi technique to obtain consensus of concept mapping care plan and multiple choice questions (MCQ) in Diabetic Mellitus subject. In the first round, participants were given a structured questionnaire regarding item of concept mapping care plan and MCQ in Diabetic Mellitus subject. In the second round, the mean and median values of round one were added. In the third round, the mean and median values of round two were added. Participants were asked to rate the categorised responses from Round 1 on a scale of 1 to 5, with 1 being "Very Irrelevant" and 5 being "Very Relevant". This technique does not require that participants be collocated or meet face-to-face, thereby making it useful to conduct surveys with qualified people over a wide geographic area. The feedback process allows and encourages the selected Delphi participants to reassess their initial judgements about the information provided in previous iterations. The analysis of consensus data of the experts was done based on median, inter quartile range and quartile deviation on round one, two and three data. The median score was used to analyse the level of consensus of experts and result shows that in all three rounds Delphi the medium result more than 4. It reported that level of importance of the statements were high. As a conclusion, the concept mapping care plan and MCQ have meets the consensus by using three rounds of Delphi techniques. Therefore, the Delphi technique is the best method to obtain consensus in health care education research.