Self Care Inventory – Patient Version

Primary Contact:

Michela Luciani, PhD, RN
School of Nursing | Dept. of Medicine and Surgery
University of Milano – Bicocca
Via Cadore 48, Monza, 20900
michela.luciani@unimib.it

The Self-care Inventory (SCI) was developed by Dr. Luciani and Prof. Ausili at University of Milano-Bicocca, and Prof. Riegel to reflect self-care of the General Adult Population.

We used the core concepts of the Self-care of Chronic Illness Theory focusing the questions on general health behaviors used by people regardless of their health status. Specifically, we propose that since self-care is used in ill and healthy states, everyone undertakes some level of health-promoting self-care every day.

The SCI has 20 5-point Likert items and 3 separate scales: self-care maintenance (8 items), self-care monitoring (8 items), and self-care management (6 items). Self-care maintenance addresses those activities aimed at maintaining the best possible health status through health promoting practices, such as avoiding tobacco use and regularly visiting healthcare providers. Self-care monitoring reflects body listening with awareness of symptoms and bodily changes. Self-care management comprises those actions aimed at controlling or managing said symptoms and changes.

We recommend using the Self-care Inventory with the Self-care Self-efficacy scale (10 items) modified for the General Adult Population. Self-care self-efficacy is not a part of self-care, but a factor that we have found in many other studies as strongly influencing self-care. Self-care self-efficacy reflects confidence in one’s ability to perform and persist in performing self-care.

For the scoring of the Instrument please refer to

To score the Self-Care Inventory, use the following algorithm:

TOT_MAINT100=(TOT_MAINT-8)*(100/32);
TOT_MONIT100=(TOT_MONIT-6)*(100/24);
TOT_MANAG100=(TOT_MANAG-6)*(100/24).

To score the Self-care Self-efficacy Scale for the General Adult Population, use the following algorithm:

TOT_SELF_EFF100=(TOT_SELF_EFF-10)*(100/40).

A more detailed description of instrument scoring is found on the website under Additional Resources.

Reference: Luciani, M., De Maria, M., Page, S. D., Barbaranelli, C., Ausili, D., & Riegel, B. (2022). Measuring self-care in the general adult population: Development and psychometric testing of the Self-Care Inventory. BMC Public Health, 22(1), 598. https://doi.org/10.1186/s12889-022-12913-7