Health attitude survey - A scale for assessing somatizing patients

The authors designed an instrument, the Health Attitude Survey, to assess s omatization, and administered it to over 1,000 patients attending a general medicine clinic. Within this population, a series of somatizing patients a nd control patients were identified for purposes of developing and testing the instrument. The 27-item scale was rapidly administered and acceptable t o the patients, Based on comparisons with other measures of somatization, t he instrument appeared to be a valid measure of the attitudes and perceptio ns of somatizing patients, and it distinguished these patients from the con trol subjects. The measure showed acceptable predictive value and may prove useful in clinical settings, where rapid screening is desired.