What Is It?
The Tampa Scale for Kinesiophobia (TSK) is a 17 item questionnaire used to identify fear of movement due to pain. Each item is a statement scored on a 4-point scale, 1 (strongly disagree) to 4 (strongly agree). To score this outcome measure, items 4, 8, 12 and 16 are inversely scored. A global score of all items are calculated and used to determine severity of fear of movement. Higher scores indicate a higher degree of kinesiophobia, while a score of >37 is considered “high”.
Our Thoughts:
Fear avoidance is a yellow flag for persistent pain and poor treatment outcomes. The TSK is a very useful outcome measure to use with any patient population, as it will help you identify fear of movement. If identified early on, education can be implemented to adjust this negative belief.
Access