Report Viewer

NINDS CDE Notice of Copyright
Parkinson's Disease Fatigue Scale (PFS-16)
Availability
Please visit this website for more information about the instrument: Parkinson's Disease Fatigue Scale
Classification
Supplemental: Parkinson's Disease (PD)
Short Description of Instrument
The PFS-16 scale was designed to tap a single construct encompassing the physical aspects of fatigue and their impact on the patient's daily function. The scale deliberately excludes emotional and cognitive features that may occur as part of the fatigue experience, but which may also occur independently in Parkinsonism.
Twelve studies have used this scale, with either a 3.3, 4 or 8 cut-off score (cited in Siciliano meta-analysis 2018).
Scoring and Psychometric Properties
Scoring: The scale is 16 items, self-report.
 
Psychometric Properties: Using full Likert scale, average score of =2.95 optimally distinguished those who experienced fatigue from those who did not with a sensitivity of 81.0% and specificity of 85.7% (area under the curve: 87.5%). For screening, binary responses, =8 identified those perceiving fatigue to be a problem with a sensitivity of 89.5% with a specificity of 83.3% (area beneath the curve: 93.4%).
Rationale/Justification
Strengths: High internal consistency (Cronbach's a=0.98). Initial and confirmatory factor analyses also suggested that the scale is tapping a single coherent construct. Excludes cognitive and emotional aspects. Only 5 minutes to administer.
 
Weaknesses: Test-retest reliabilities of the individual items were modest, those based on the total scores were more robust (0.82-0.83).
References
Key Reference:
Brown RG, Dittner A, Findley L, Wessely SC. The Parkinson fatigue scale. Parkinsonism Relat Disord. 2005 Jan;11(1):49-55.
 
Additional References:
çilga G, Genç A, çolakoglu BD, Kahraman T. Turkish adaptation of Parkinson fatigue scale and investigating its psychometric properties. Int J Rehabil Res. 2019 Mar;42(1):20-25. (Validated in Turkish)
 
Dagklis IE, Tsantaki E, Kazis D, Theodoridou V, Papagiannopoulos S, Ntantos D, Bostantjopoulou S. The Parkinson fatigue scale: an evaluation of its validity and reliability in Greek Parkinson's disease patients. Neurol Sci. 2019 Apr;40(4):683-690. (Validated in Greek in PD)
 
Fu R, Cui SS, Du JJ, Huang P, He YC, Gao C, Luo XG, Chen SD. Validation of the Parkinson Fatigue Scale in Chinese Parkinson's disease patients. Brain Behav. 2017 May 2;7(6):e00712. (Validated in Chinese in PD)
 
Hagell P, Rosblom T, PÅlhagen S. A Swedish version of the 16-item Parkinson fatigue scale (PFS-16). Acta Neurol Scand. 2012 Apr;125(4):288-92. (Validated in Swedish)
 
Martinez-Martin P, Wetmore JB, Arbelo JM, Catalán MJ, Valldeoriola F, Rodriguez-Blazquez C. Validation study of the Parkinson's Fatigue Scale in advanced Parkinson's disease. Patient Relat Outcome Meas. 2019 Apr 17;10:141-152. (Validated in Spanish in advanced PD)
 
Nilsson MH, Bladh S, Hagell P. Fatigue in Parkinson's disease: measurement properties of a generic and a condition-specific rating scale. J Pain Symptom Manage. 2013 Nov;46(5):737-46.
 
Siciliano M, Chiorri C, De Micco R, Russo A, Tedeschi G, Trojano L, Tessitore A. Fatigue in Parkinson's disease: Italian validation of the Parkinson Fatigue Scale and the Fatigue Severity Scale using a Rasch analysis approach. Parkinsonism Relat Disord. 2019 Aug;65:105-110. (Validated in Italian in PD)
 
Siciliano M, Trojano L, Santangelo G, De Micco R, Tedeschi G, Tessitore A. Fatigue in Parkinson's disease: A systematic review and meta-analysis. Mov Disord. 2018 Nov;33(11):1712-1723.
 
Document last updated August 2022