Do you ever remember being a child and being taken to an ice-cream shop with 66 flavours? Inevitably with so much choice you just walk out with the one you know, vanilla or chocolate.
Monitoring your clients progress during trauma therapy is a great way to ensure good overall outcomes. However, there are many different measures to choose from. We are potentially at risk of repeating the ice-cream shop choice! This list of acronyms highlights the variety of choice when it comes to outcome measures; DAPS, DAPS – II, DTS, HTQ, IES, IES-R, mPSS-SR, M-PTSD, M-PTSD-C, PCL-5, PCL-C, PCL-M, PCL-S, PDS, PDS-5, PSS-SR, SPTSS, SRIP, SPRINT, TSC-40, TSI, TSI-2.
Holly Bowen-Salter and colleagues (2021) examined self-report outcome measures for PTSD, in an attempt to identify which might be most useful. They examined Twenty-two self-report outcome measures for PTSD which were extracted from 256 randomised controlled trials, 110 validation papers were found for these measures. For those who love lists, as much as ice-cream here are the outcome measures they examined. Those with an asterisk denote that they are tied to DSM5 diagnostic criteria. All others were tied to DSM-IV criteria. Food for thought, if establishing diagnosis is also part of your practice. Acronyms are in brackets.
- Detailed Assessment of Post-Traumatic Stress (DAPS)
- Detailed Assessment of Post-Traumatic Stress – 2nd Edition (DAPS – II)*
- Davidson Trauma Scale (DTS)
- Harvard Trauma Questionnaire (HTQ)
- Impact of Events Scale (IES)
- Impact of Events Scale – Revised (IES-R)
- Modified PTSD Symptom Scale – Self-Report (mPSS-SR)
- Mississippi Scale for Combat-Related PTSD (M-PTSD)
- Mississippi Scale for Combat-Related PTSD – Civilian (M-PTSD-C)
- PTSD Checklist – Five (PCL-5)*
- PTSD Checklist – Military (PCL-C)
- PTSD Checklist – Civilian (PCL-M)
- PTSD Checklist – Specific (PCL-S)
- Posttraumatic Diagnostic Scale (PDS)
- Posttraumatic Diagnostic Scale – Five (PDS-5)*
- PTSD Symptom Scale – Self-Report (PSS-SR)
- The Screen for Posttraumatic Stress Symptoms (SPTSS)
- Self-Rating Inventory for Posttraumatic Stress Disorder (SRIP)
- The Short Post- Traumatic Stress Disorder Rating Interview (SPRINT)
- Trauma Symptom Checklist – 40 (TSC-40)
- Trauma Symptom Inventory (TSI)
- Trauma Symptom Inventory – version 2 (TSI-2)*
Holly Bowen-Salter and colleagues (2021) reported that only 13 of the 22 outcome measures had been validated in populations made up of multiple kinds of trauma-exposure populations or non-specific trauma. Overall the measures covered 12 specific trauma exposure populations as well as nonspecific trauma exposure populations. The specific populations included:
- Emergency Services
- Illness and Hospitalisation
- Maternity
- Migrants
- Military, War and Combat-related
- Motor Vehicle Accidents
- Natural Disasters
- Prison
- Refugees and Asylum Seekers
- Sexual and Domestic Violence
- Substance Abuse
- Victims of Crime
This may be a useful consideration for clinicians working in specific populations. An adapted version of Table three from the study is included below. This highlights the populations and recommended measures. In general, clinical practice the population is broad and in this case the team recommended both the PCL-5 and SPRINT. They reported that these were found to be the most psychometrically valid measures, with the highest scoring clinical utility.
Summary
There is a lot of choice when it comes to outcome measures, and this study did not cover emerging measures for the ICD-11 PTSD/CPTSD area. However for clinicians working in private practice with the general population the PCL-5 and SPRINT appear to be good options. The PCL5 is 20 items long and matches with DSM5 criteria. In contrast the sprint is very short at only 8 items it has not been updated to correspond to the DSM5.
Table 3. Adapted from Bowen-Salter (2021) Validated outcome measures by trauma-exposure population
| Emergency Services | Illness | Maternity | Migrant | Military | MVA | Natural Disaster | Prison | Refugee | Sexual & Domestic Violence | Substance Abuse | Victim of Crime |
| IES SRIP | SPTSS PCL-C IES PSS-S PCL- 5 DTS IES-R PDS | PCL-C PDS PSS-SR TSI | PCL-C PCL-5 | PCL-5 IES M-PTSD PCL- M PCL-C DTS PDS TSI HTQ | PSS-SR IES-R: | DTS SPRINT PCL-C M-PTSD-C IES-R | DTS | IES-R HTQ PDS | PCL-C TSC-40 DTS M-PTSD- C | mPSS-SR SRIP PDS IES-R | IES PSS-SR |
Bold denotes the recommended outcome measure based on scores.
Reference
Bowen-Salter, H., Kernot, J., Baker, A., Posselt, M., & Boshoff, K. (2021). Self-reported outcome measures for adults with post-traumatic stress disorder: Towards recommendations for clinical practice. Australian Journal of Psychology, 73(3), 282–292. https://doi.org/10.1080/00049530.2021.1893615
