Fatigue Severity Scale

 

Original Editor - Sinead Greenan

Top Contributors - Sinead Greenan, Kim Jackson, Lauren Lopez, Laura Ritchie, Lucinda hampton, Evan Thomas, WikiSysop, Vidya Acharya, Candace Goh, Claire Knott and Wanda van Niekerk

Objective

The Fatigue Severity Scale is a 9-item scale which measures the severity of fatigue and its effect on a person's activities and lifestyle in patients with a variety of disorders

Intended Population

Those with a variety of diagnoses including arthritis, fibromyalgia, Multiple sclerosis, Parkinson’s disease and stroke.

Method of Use

• A 9-item questionnaire with questions related to how fatigue interferes with certain activities and rates its severity
• The items are scored on a 7 point scale with 1 = strongly disagree and 7= strongly agree
• The minimum score = 9 and maximum score possible = 63. Higher the score = greater fatigue severity
• Another way of scoring: mean of all the scores with minimum score being 1 and maximum score being 7
• Self-report scale

Evidence

Reliability

Test-retest Reliability

Parkinson's Disease:

(Valderramas et al, 2012; n = 30, mean age = 62 (11) years, mean time post- PD = 7.6 (6.5) years) 

• The evaluation of the FSS-BR (Fatigue Severity Scale-Brazilian-Portuguese version) suggests an excellent Test-retest reliability (ICC = 0.91)

Interrater/Intrarater Reliability

Not established

Validity

Criterion Validity (Predictive/Concurrent)

Not established

Construct Validity (Convergent/Discriminant)

Convergent Validity:

Parkinson’s Disease:

• Excellent (r = -0.77) negative correlation with Functional Assessment of Chronic Illness Therapy-Fatigue (FACIT-F) scale (Hagell et al, 2006) 
• Excellent (r = 0.62) correlation with Nottingham Health Profile (NHP-EN) scale (Hagell et al, 2006) 
• Excellent (r = 0.84) correlation with Parkinson’s Fatigue (PFS) scale (Grace et al, 2006) 
• Poor-adequate (r = 0.22-0.47) correlation with Parkinson’s Disease Questionnaire-39 (PDQ-39) scale (Herlofson et al, 2003; n = 66, mean age = 70.8 (9.9) years, time since PD = 70.2 (56.1) months) 

Responsiveness

Parkinson’s Disease:

Responsiveness to Pharmocological Intervention Mendoca et al, 2007; n = 17 treatment arm, receiving methyphenidate; mean age = 62.2(10), mean H&Y Stage = 2.58(0.5); n = 19 placebo arm, mean age = 66.3(7.6), mean H&Y Stage = 2.38(0.3) 

• Those persons in the treatment arm had a significant (p < 0.04) reduction in FSS Score by 6.5 points (from FSS = 43.8 at baseline); Cohen’s d = 0.79
• Smaller reductions in the placebo group did not reach levels of significance Response to Exercise Intervention: Winward et al, 2010; H&Y 0-4. n = 20 exercise group, mean age = 63.4(6.7); n = 19 control group, mean age = 64.9(9.6)
• No significant difference in score reduction between exercise and control group at 12 weeks