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Rehab Measures

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Purpose

Assesses fatigue in 3 categories:

  1. fatigue associated with asthenia (fatigue at rest);

  2. fatigue with exercise; and

  3. fatigue with worsening symptoms

Link to Instrument

Instrument Details

Acronym FDS

Area of Assessment

Activities of Daily Living
Life Participation
Social Relationships

Assessment Type

Patient Reported Outcomes

Administration Mode

Paper & Pencil

Cost

Free

Diagnosis/Conditions

  • Multiple Sclerosis

Key Descriptions

  • FDS is a five-category interview-based scale used to assess fatigue in three categories:
    (1) fatigue associated with asthenia (fatigue at rest);
    (2) fatigue with exercise, and
    (3) fatigue with worsening symptoms.
  • Scale is scored for initiative, modality, severity, frequency, and presence or absence of Uhthoff’s phenomenon.
  • The interviewer asks questions and scores most questions on a scale of 0-3.
  • The total score = initiative X (modality + frequency + severity) + Uthoff’s; the total score range is 0-17. The lower the score, the less fatigue-related disability.
  • Specific instructions are available only in Spanish.

Number of Items

12

Time to Administer

 minutes

Required Training

Reading an Article/Manual

Instrument Reviewers

Initially reviewed by Kathleen Brandfass, MS, PT and the MS EDGE task force of the neurology section of the APTA in 2011; updated by Tess Allen, Alice Merrill, and Grace Schaeffer, Master of Science in Occupational Therapy students at the University of Illinois at Chicago.

ICF Domain

Activity
Body Function

Measurement Domain

General Health

Considerations

  • There is no formal manual available in online databases regarding the administration of this assessment tool, although procedure may be inferred from Iriarte et. al (1999).

  • A description of the instrument’s administration may be available in a Spanish language publication only (Iriarte & de Castro, 1994).

Multiple Sclerosis

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Interrater/Intrarater Reliability

Multiple Sclerosis: (Iriarte, Katsimakis, & de Castro, 1999; n = 155; female = 105; male = 50; mean age = 36.2 (11.1))

  • Adequate interrater reliability (Kappa = 0.53)

Bibliography

Attarian, H. P., Brown, K. M., et al. (2004). "The relationship of sleep disturbances and fatigue in multiple sclerosis." Arch Neurol 61(4): 525-528. Find it on PubMed

Bakshi, R. (2003). "Fatigue associated with multiple sclerosis: diagnosis, impact and management." Mult Scler 9(3): 219-227. Find it on PubMed

Benito-Leon, J., Martínez-Martín, P., et al. (2007). "Impact of fatigue in multiple sclerosis: the Fatigue Impact Scale for Daily Use (D-FIS)." Multiple Sclerosis 13(5): 645-651. Find it on PubMed

Dittner, A. J., Wessely, S. C., et al. (2004). "The assessment of fatigue: a practical guide for clinicians and researchers." J Psychosom Res 56(2): 157-170. Find it on PubMed

Iriarte, J., Carreno, M., et al. (1996). "[Fatigue and functional system involvement in multiple sclerosis]." Neurologia 11(6): 210-215. Find it on PubMed

Iriarte, J. and de Castro, P. (1994). "[Proposal of a new scale for assessing fatigue in patients with multiple sclerosis]." Neurologia 9(3): 96-100. Find it on PubMed

Iriarte, J. and de Castro, P. (1998). "Correlation between symptom fatigue and muscular fatigue in multiple sclerosis." Eur J Neurol 5(10210893): 579-585. Find it on PubMed

Iriarte, J., Katsamakis, G., et al. (1999). "The Fatigue Descriptive Scale (FDS): a useful tool to evaluate fatigue in multiple sclerosis." Mult Scler 5(1): 10-16. Find it on PubMed

Iriarte, J., Subira, M. L., et al. (2000). "Modalities of fatigue in multiple sclerosis: correlation with clinical and biological factors." Mult Scler 6(2): 124-130. Find it on PubMed

Romani, A., Bergamaschi, R., et al. (2004). "Fatigue in multiple sclerosis: multidimensional assessment and response to symptomatic treatment." Mult Scler 10(4): 462-468. Find it on PubMed