The instruments
- PHQ-9 Depression The PHQ-9 is the nine-question depression screener used across primary care. It asks how often each problem has bothered you over the last two weeks and scores 0 to 27. 9 items 2 min
- GAD-7 Anxiety The GAD-7 is the seven-question anxiety screener used across primary care. It asks how often each problem has bothered you over the last two weeks and scores 0 to 21. 7 items 2 min
- ASRS v1.1 Adult ADHD The ASRS v1.1 is the six-question adult ADHD screener developed with the World Health Organization. It asks how often each experience happened over the past six months; four or more answers in the shaded range is a positive screen. 6 items 1 min
- PCL-5 PTSD The PCL-5 is the 20-item PTSD checklist developed by the VA National Center for PTSD. It asks how much each problem has bothered you in the past month, in relation to a very stressful experience, and scores 0 to 80. 20 items 4 min
- AUDIT Alcohol use The AUDIT is the World Health Organization's ten-question alcohol screening test, developed to identify hazardous and harmful drinking. It scores 0 to 40, and the WHO manual assigns four risk zones. One 'drink' means one standard drink (a 12 oz beer, 5 oz of wine, or 1.5 oz of spirits). 10 items 2 min
How these work, and what they cannot do
Each test is a published screening instrument in wide clinical use, reproduced as published and scored exactly as its validation study scores it, with the study cited at the bottom of the page. Each one asks about the window its own validation study uses, from the past two weeks to the past year, and the test says which.
A score estimates symptom severity over that window. It cannot diagnose. It can be moved by grief, by medical illness and by medication, which is why every result here is followed by what is worth ruling out first, quoted from clinical guidelines rather than invented by us. Whatever you score, how you actually feel is the better reason to talk with someone.
Where an instrument is not well studied at your age, the result says so. That is the case for anxiety screening after 65, and for adult ADHD at any age above 44.