Reliability and validity of the functional status questionnaire

The Functional Status Questionnaire (FSQ) originally was developed to allow the comprehensive and efficient assessment of physical, psychosocial, social, and role functioning in ambulatory patients. It is a self-administered survey that takes approximately 15 min to complete and can be scored to produce a one-page report for clinicians to use in their practices. It has been translated into Swedish, French, and German. Since the FSQ was first published, it has been used in a variety of other settings, including assessment of the impact of variations in hospital practice patterns, the study of relationships between hospital processes of care and outcomes, and other applications, including randomized controlled trials of pharmaceuticals. In this paper we provide selected data on the reliability and validity of the FSQ in different populations. Many of the data are from previously published studies. However, because of the emphasis of this issue of Quality of Life Research, we also present new data from two large studies of persons over the age of 65.