Posttraumatic diagnostic scale (PDS)
Foa‚ Cashman‚ Jaycox & Perry‚ 1997
Please indicate how many of the following events you have witnessed or experienced:
• Accident or fire
• Natural disaster
• Nonsexual assault (known assailant) _
• Nonsexual assault (unknown assailant) _
• Sexual assault (known assailant) _
• Sexual assault (unknown assailant) _
• Combat or war zone _
• Sexual abuse _
• Imprisonment _
• Torture _
• Life-threatening illness _
• Other _
Please indicate which of the above events has disturbed you most in the past month and briefly describe the event in the space provided.
________________________________________________________________________
________________________________________________________________________
________________________________________________________________________
________________________________________________________________________
________________________________________________________________________
Please refer to the above event when answering the following questions.
1. Was there any physical injury to yourself as a result of the event? Yes / No
2. Was there any physical injury to someone else as a result of the event? Yes / No
3. Did you feel that your life or someone else’s life was in danger at the time of this event? Yes / No
4. Did you have a feeling of helplessness or terror at the time of the event? Yes / No
The following items refer to the frequency with which you have experienced these symptoms in the past month:
0= Once in a while Once a week or less‚ 1= Some of the time 2 times / week‚ 2= Half the time 3 – 4 times / week‚ 3=Almost always 5 + times / week
1. having upsetting thoughts or images about the traumatic event that came into your head when you didn’t want them to
2. having bad dreams or nightmares about the traumatic event
3. Reliving the traumatic event‚ acting or feeling as if it was happening again
4. Feeling emotionally upset when you were reminded of the traumatic event (e.g. feeling scared‚ sad‚ angry‚ guilty etc)
5. Experiencing physical reactions when you were reminded of the traumatic event (eg breaking out in a sweat‚ heart beating fast)
6. Trying not to think about‚ or have feelings about the traumatic event
7. Trying to avoid activities‚ people or places that remind you of the traumatic event
8. In ability to recall an important aspect of the trauma
9. having much less interest or participating much less often in important activities
10. Feeling distant or cut off from people around you
11. Feeling emotionally numb (for example being unable to cry or unable to have loving feelings)
12. Feeling as if your future plans or hopes will not come true (for example you will not have a career‚ marriage‚ children or a long life)
13. having trouble falling or staying asleep
14. Feeling irritable or having fits of anger
15. having trouble concentrating (for example drifting in and out of conversations‚ losing track of a story on television‚ forgetting what you read)
16. Being overly alert (for example checking to see who is around you‚ being uncomfortable with your back to a door etc)
17. Being jumpy and easily startled (for example when someone walks up behind you)
Please indicate whether your symptoms have interfered with the following areas within the past month:
1. Work Yes / No
2. Household duties Yes / No
3. Friendships Yes / No
4. Family relationships Yes / No
5. Fun and leisure activities Yes / No
6. Schoolwork Yes / No
7. Sex life Yes / No
8. General satisfaction with life Yes / No
9. Overall level of functioning Yes / No
The scale is intended to screen for the presence of PTSD in patients who have identified themselves as victims of a traumatic event or to assess symptom severity and functioning in patients already identified as suffering from PTSD. The test is self-administered and can usually be completed within 10–15 min and requires a reading age of ∼13 years. The pencil and paper and computerized scoring versions of the PDS are available from the test distributor.
Test items mirror DSM IV criteria for PTSD and items are framed in accessible language. Questions relate to the frequency of distressing and intrusive thoughts‚ post-traumatic avoidance and hyper arousal.
· diagnosis of Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder
· Stress
This instrument can be found on pages 320-322 of The Comorbidity Between Eating Disorders and Anxiety Disorders. Compiled by JESSICA. M. SWINBOURNE. Available online at: http://ses.library.usyd.edu.au/bitstream/2123/4026/1/j-swinbourne-thesis.pdf
Requires a reading age of ∼13 years
The PDS requires 5 minutes to score by hand.
A diagnosis of PTSD is only made if all the six DSM-IV criteria are endorsed. If one or more of the criteria is not met a diagnosis of PTSD is not made. When a particular criterion cannot be assessed because the client omitted too many items‚ the criterion is considered incomplete and this precludes a diagnosis of PTSD.
The Symptom Severity Score ranges from 0 to 51 which is obtained by adding up the response weights of the individual’s responses to items 22 to 38. Each item enquires on how often a particular PTSD symptom has bothered the subject in the past month. The weights are as listed below:
0 = not at all or only one time
1 = once a week or less/once in a while
2 = 2 to 4 times a week/ half the time
3 = 5 or more times a week/ almost always
The cut-offs for the symptoms severity rating categories are listed below:
< 10 mild
>11 and < 20 moderate
>21 and < 35 moderate to severe
>36 severe
The number of symptoms endorsed can range from 0 to 17. This is obtained by counting the number of symptoms the respondent endorsed with a response other then 0 for items 22 to 38.
Foa‚ E. B.‚ Cashman‚ L.‚ Jaycox‚ L. & Perry‚ K. (1997). The validation of a self-report measure of posttraumatic stress disorder : the Posttraumatic Diagnostic Scale. Psychological Assessment 9‚ 445–451.
Foa. E. B. (1995). Posttraumatic Stress Diagnostic Scale Manual. United States of America: National Computer Systems‚ Inc.
Foa. E. B.‚ Riggs‚ D.S.‚ Dancu‚ C. V.‚ and Rothbaum‚ B. O. (1993). Reliability and validity of a brief instrument for assessing post-traumatic stress disorder. Journal of Traumatic Stress‚ 6‚459-473.
http://www.clintools.com/victims/resources/assessment/ptsd/pds.html
Posttraumatic diagnostic scale (PDS)
Foa‚ Cashman‚ Jaycox & Perry‚ 1997
Please indicate how many of the following events you have witnessed or experienced:
• Accident or fire
• Natural disaster
• Nonsexual assault (known assailant) _
• Nonsexual assault (unknown assailant) _
• Sexual assault (known assailant) _
• Sexual assault (unknown assailant) _
• Combat or war zone _
• Sexual abuse _
• Imprisonment _
• Torture _
• Life-threatening illness _
• Other _
Please indicate which of the above events has disturbed you most in the past month and briefly describe the event in the space provided.
________________________________________________________________________
________________________________________________________________________
________________________________________________________________________
________________________________________________________________________
________________________________________________________________________
Please refer to the above event when answering the following questions.
1. Was there any physical injury to yourself as a result of the event? Yes / No
2. Was there any physical injury to someone else as a result of the event? Yes / No
3. Did you feel that your life or someone else’s life was in danger at the time of this event? Yes / No
4. Did you have a feeling of helplessness or terror at the time of the event? Yes / No
The following items refer to the frequency with which you have experienced these symptoms in the past month:
0= Once in a while Once a week or less‚ 1= Some of the time 2 times / week‚ 2= Half the time 3 – 4 times / week‚ 3=Almost always 5 + times / week
1. having upsetting thoughts or images about the traumatic event that came into your head when you didn’t want them to
2. having bad dreams or nightmares about the traumatic event
3. Reliving the traumatic event‚ acting or feeling as if it was happening again
4. Feeling emotionally upset when you were reminded of the traumatic event (e.g. feeling scared‚ sad‚ angry‚ guilty etc)
5. Experiencing physical reactions when you were reminded of the traumatic event (eg breaking out in a sweat‚ heart beating fast)
6. Trying not to think about‚ or have feelings about the traumatic event
7. Trying to avoid activities‚ people or places that remind you of the traumatic event
8. In ability to recall an important aspect of the trauma
9. having much less interest or participating much less often in important activities
10. Feeling distant or cut off from people around you
11. Feeling emotionally numb (for example being unable to cry or unable to have loving feelings)
12. Feeling as if your future plans or hopes will not come true (for example you will not have a career‚ marriage‚ children or a long life)
13. having trouble falling or staying asleep
14. Feeling irritable or having fits of anger
15. having trouble concentrating (for example drifting in and out of conversations‚ losing track of a story on television‚ forgetting what you read)
16. Being overly alert (for example checking to see who is around you‚ being uncomfortable with your back to a door etc)
17. Being jumpy and easily startled (for example when someone walks up behind you)
Please indicate whether your symptoms have interfered with the following areas within the past month:
1. Work Yes / No
2. Household duties Yes / No
3. Friendships Yes / No
4. Family relationships Yes / No
5. Fun and leisure activities Yes / No
6. Schoolwork Yes / No
7. Sex life Yes / No
8. General satisfaction with life Yes / No
9. Overall level of functioning Yes / No
The scale is intended to screen for the presence of PTSD in patients who have identified themselves as victims of a traumatic event or to assess symptom severity and functioning in patients already identified as suffering from PTSD. The test is self-administered and can usually be completed within 10–15 min and requires a reading age of ∼13 years. The pencil and paper and computerized scoring versions of the PDS are available from the test distributor.
Test items mirror DSM IV criteria for PTSD and items are framed in accessible language. Questions relate to the frequency of distressing and intrusive thoughts‚ post-traumatic avoidance and hyper arousal.
· diagnosis of Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder
· Stress
This instrument can be found on pages 320-322 of The Comorbidity Between Eating Disorders and Anxiety Disorders. Compiled by JESSICA. M. SWINBOURNE. Available online at: http://ses.library.usyd.edu.au/bitstream/2123/4026/1/j-swinbourne-thesis.pdf
Requires a reading age of ∼13 years
The PDS requires 5 minutes to score by hand.
A diagnosis of PTSD is only made if all the six DSM-IV criteria are endorsed. If one or more of the criteria is not met a diagnosis of PTSD is not made. When a particular criterion cannot be assessed because the client omitted too many items‚ the criterion is considered incomplete and this precludes a diagnosis of PTSD.
The Symptom Severity Score ranges from 0 to 51 which is obtained by adding up the response weights of the individual’s responses to items 22 to 38. Each item enquires on how often a particular PTSD symptom has bothered the subject in the past month. The weights are as listed below:
0 = not at all or only one time
1 = once a week or less/once in a while
2 = 2 to 4 times a week/ half the time
3 = 5 or more times a week/ almost always
The cut-offs for the symptoms severity rating categories are listed below:
< 10 mild
>11 and < 20 moderate
>21 and < 35 moderate to severe
>36 severe
The number of symptoms endorsed can range from 0 to 17. This is obtained by counting the number of symptoms the respondent endorsed with a response other then 0 for items 22 to 38.
Foa‚ E. B.‚ Cashman‚ L.‚ Jaycox‚ L. & Perry‚ K. (1997). The validation of a self-report measure of posttraumatic stress disorder : the Posttraumatic Diagnostic Scale. Psychological Assessment 9‚ 445–451.
Foa. E. B. (1995). Posttraumatic Stress Diagnostic Scale Manual. United States of America: National Computer Systems‚ Inc.
Foa. E. B.‚ Riggs‚ D.S.‚ Dancu‚ C. V.‚ and Rothbaum‚ B. O. (1993). Reliability and validity of a brief instrument for assessing post-traumatic stress disorder. Journal of Traumatic Stress‚ 6‚459-473.