What is the SCARED Assessment for anxiety?

What is the SCARED Assessment?

The Screen for Child Anxiety-Related Disorders (SCARED) assessment is a quick and simple screening tool for childhood anxiety. It combines input from parents and their children to assess symptoms that correspond with several major anxiety disorders.

Both the patient or child report (SCARED-C) and parent report (SCARED-P) contain items that screen for the same symptoms. These items analyze symptoms across five domains of anxiety, including:

1. Generalized anxiety

2. Separation anxiety

3. Social anxiety

4. Panic or somatic symptoms

5. School avoidance

There are specific ages for SCARED assessment validity; in other words, the use of the SCARED anxiety assessment has only been validated for children ages eight to 18.

However, its recommended use for children between eight and 11 years of age differs slightly. Having a clinician explain all of the assessment’s questions or having an adult present to answer the child’s questions is best practice for this age group.

How accurate is the SCARED screening tool?

The SCARED screener has historically demonstrated strong psychometric properties. However, researchers have found that a discrepancy between child and parent scores may exist. Parents generally tend to report fewer symptoms than their children; this discrepancy is particularly pronounced among children who are considered clinically anxious.

Initial research into the reliability of SCARED found the tool demonstrated good internal consistency, test-retest reliability, and validity. A recent 2018 meta-analysis supports this conclusion. After examining the psychometric properties of the SCARED instrument described in 65 studies, the analysis concluded that:

• Both the child and parent versions of SCARED exhibited excellent internal consistency
• The child version exhibited moderate to large test-retest reliabilities
• Both child and parent responses to SCARED assessments exhibited moderate to large correlations

Who is the SCARED assessment for?

The SCARED screening tool is designed for children, but it may be used as part of routine screening for anxiety in anyone ages eight to 64.

Its use may be beneficial for providers in inpatient, outpatient, or school-based settings who are looking to measure a patient’s anxiety and understand its potential impact on care.

Likewise, SCARED assists mental and behavioral health providers during diagnostic procedures and in monitoring the effectiveness of treatment interventions.

SCARED Screener Previews: What to Expect

The SCARED assessment is typically administered prior to a treatment session and asks respondents to consider the frequency of symptoms over the past three months. Each version of the SCARED screener takes about 10 minutes to complete.

While the items on the instrument are the same across both versions, their language differs slightly to tailor them to children and parents, respectively.

Click here to view all items on the SCARED instrument. (PDF)

Child Version

Below is a simplified version of the directions listed on the SCARED-C screening tool, as well as a sample of a few items that screen for anxiety.

Directions:

For each sentence, fill in one circle that corresponds to the response that seems to describe you for the last three months. 

There are a total of 41 items on SCARED-C, each with three answer options. Patients complete the questionnaire by thinking carefully about each item and then choosing the answer that most accurately reflects their experiences.

Parent Version

The SCARED-P instrument looks nearly identical to SCARED-C, with a few minor differences in the directions given and the framing of its items. Below is a brief preview of both.

Directions:

For each statement, fill in one circle that corresponds to the response that seems to describe your child for the last three months. Please respond to all statements as well as you can, even if some do not seem to concern your child.

Like SCARED-C, the parent version of SCARED has 41 total items.

SCARED Assessment Scoring

The same scale is used for SCARED screening scoring across both versions. A total score is first calculated to measure the likelihood that an anxiety disorder is present.

Then, subscores for certain items on the assessment are totalled to provide further insight into which anxiety domain(s) are most affected. Here’s a breakdown of the scoring guidelines for SCARED assessments:

As a result, with the insights provided by SCARED assessments, clinicians can accurately diagnose and monitor specific anxiety disorders.

Streamline routine clinical assessments with Linear Health

Clinical assessment tools like the SCARED screener can be a crucial part of delivering quality, patient-centered care. But keeping up with routine assessments – and who needs them, at what times they’re required – can be a challenge for teams of health workers, creating a significant administrative burden that limits their capacity for care.

With the help of Linear Health, offering data-driven, specific, and tailored care to each patient doesn’t have to come at the expense of valuable time or resources.

Digitizing your clinical assessments, including the SCARED screener, allows you to automate the process of sending, receiving, and documenting them.

Patients can automatically receive assessments on a regular basis without any intervention on your part. Patient responses can then be submitted to your health records system without the need for manual recording.

When it comes time for a treatment session, providers can quickly and easily pull up current and past assessment data to monitor patient progress and adjust their approach to care as needed.

Linear Health is here to help you reinvent the way you deliver care to your patients with technology that’s designed with your needs in mind. Ready to learn more? Book a demo or contact us today to get started.