OBJECTIVE: Describe the development of an instrument to identify records of their stay at the intensive care unit, and verify content validation and the applicability of the instrument. METHOD: It is a methodological study, based in Pasquali's (1998) psychological scale elaboration theory. To elaborate the instrument, three stages were followed: the built of items; appearance and content validation analysis performed by a panel of experts; together with implementation of a pilot study to validation instrument applicability in the targeted population. RESULTS: There was little unconformity among the experts when analyzing the questions according to the domain of the constructor. The items were positively evaluated having a punctuation value above 80%, which abides the instrument validation criteria. Thus, the items were considered consistent in relation to the domain and constructor allowing identification of recollection of memories lived by the patients during their stay at the ICU. CONCLUSIONS: The proposed items demonstrated to be comprehensive, clear, and having an adequate presentation structure. The instrument shows validation to the content certified by a panel of experts, thus demonstrating to have theoretical characteristics to identify short and long term recollections of ICU patients.
Validation studies; Intensive Care Units; memory; illusions
