Kessler-10 Psychological Distress

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What is K10

The Kessler Psychological Distress Scale 10 (K10) is a 10-question screening scale of psychological distress. This is intended to yield a global measure of distress based on questions about anxiety and depressive symptoms that a person has experienced in the most recent 4 week period. The scale was designed to be sensitive around the threshold for the clinically significant range of the distribution of nonspecific distress in an effort to maximize the ability to discriminate cases of serious mental illness (SMI) from non-cases.

K10 Printable PDF

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K10 Scoring and Interpretation

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Domain

Psychological Distress

What does K10 measure

The purpose of the evaluation is to:

screen for psychological distress,
identify levels of distress,
discriminate cases of serious mental illness (SMI) from non-cases, and
complement the dimensional assessments of non-specific impairment, such as the Global Assessment of Functioning (GAF).

Administration

Self-administered

Type of outcome tool

Clinical

Assessment modes

Questionnaire

Age and eligibility

11 years and above

Estimated time

2 to 3 minutes

Notes

Since the questionnaire relies on client self-report, all responses should be verified by the clinician, and a definitive diagnosis is made on clinical grounds taking into account how well the client understood the questionnaire, as well as other relevant information from the client.

This is a screening instrument and practitioners should make a clinical judgement as to whether a person needs treatment.

Scores usually decline with effective treatment. Patients whose scores remain above 24 after treatment should be reviewed and specialist referral considered.

The K10 cannot be used to determine major mental illnesses (such as psychoses) but has been validated as a simple measure of anxiety, depression and worry (psychological distress).

For other questions that are routinely administered along with the scales to learn about persistence and impairment, please refer to Kessler Psychological Distress Scale 10+ (K10+).

For interviewer administration and interview training notes, please refer to Interviewer Administered K10+.

Attribution and References

Kessler, R.C., Barker, P.R., Colpe, L.J., Epstein, J.F., Gfroerer, J.C., Hiripi, E., Howes, M.J, Normand, S-L.T., Manderscheid, R.W., Walters, E.E., Zaslavsky, A.M. (2003). Screening for serious mental illness in the general population Archives of General Psychiatry. 60(2), 184-189.

Official website

Archived link

Kessler RC, Andrews G, Colpe LJ, Hiripi E, Mroczek DK, Normand SL, Walters EE, Zaslavsky AM. Short screening scales to monitor population prevalences and trends in non-specific psychological distress. Psychol Med. 2002 Aug;32(6):959-76. doi: 10.1017/s0033291702006074. PMID: 12214795.

Archived link