Chalder Fatigue Questionnaire - 11-item version
The Chalder Fatigue Questionnaire 11-item version measures physical and mental fatigue symptoms for clinician review. This page is catalogue information. It does not order blood tests.
Overview
What is the CFQ-11?
CFQ-11 organises fatigue-symptom reporting. It does not diagnose chronic fatigue, anaemia, or a sleep disorder, and it does not determine laboratory orders.
Development and clinical use
Chalder and colleagues published the fatigue scale in 1993. The 11-item version, with physical and mental fatigue scales, was examined in clinical and community samples by Cella and Chalder in 2010.
- Catalogue status
- Educational entry
- Production scoring
- Not independently verified
- Mode
- self-report
- Typical use
- Clinician-reviewed intake
- Clinical role
- Physical and mental fatigue measurement for clinician review
Administration
A focused client experience
CFQ-11 is completed as a focused self-report and stored for clinician review. This public page does not collect answers or return a score.
- One question at a time with visible progress
- Large keyboard-operable response choices
- Previous, next, and answer-review steps
- Clear confirmation that results go to the clinic
The illustration shows the answer layout only.
Report showcase
Designed to make evidence easy to review
The downloadable synthetic example illustrates report layout using invented response patterns, without patient data or instrument questions.
- Named instrument, version, and provenance
- Item-level response pattern without source wording
- Methodology, references, and clinical boundary
- Responsible clinician review rather than automated conclusions
Clinician review required
Methodology
Understand the measure and its scoring conventions
Each item scores 0 to 3, from less than usual to much more than usual (item 11: better than usual to much worse than usual). The total is 0 to 33, with physical fatigue on items 1 to 7 (0 to 21) and mental fatigue on items 8 to 11 (0 to 12). A separate bimodal total counts items answered more than usual or much more than usual (item 11: worse or much worse), and the published caseness threshold is a bimodal total of 4 or more. No Likert total cut-off is applied.
References
- Cella and Chalder 2010Cella M, Chalder T. Measuring fatigue in clinical and community settings. J Psychosom Res. 2010;69(1):17-22.
- Chalder et al. 1993Chalder T, Berelowitz G, Pawlikowska T, et al. Development of a fatigue scale. J Psychosom Res. 1993;37(2):147-153.
- Krakau et al. 2025Krakau L, Wicke F, Häuser W, Beutel ME, Brähler E, Hettich-Damm N. Chronic fatigue: psychometric properties and updated norm values of the Chalder fatigue scale in a cross-sectional sample representative of the German population. Ann Med. 2025;57(1):2524087.
Questions
What clinics ask before they evaluate the CFQ-11
These answers stay inside educational catalogue scope. They do not replace official manuals or clinician judgement.
Does CFQ-11 diagnose chronic fatigue syndrome?
No. It is a fatigue-symptom questionnaire. Diagnosis remains a clinician task.
Does it order blood tests?
No. Symptom measures do not determine laboratory work.
Can I complete CFQ-11 here?
No. This page is educational catalogue information.
What should clinics check before use?
The official administration guidance and suitability for the clinical purpose.
Keep questionnaires distinct from laboratory work.
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