The Family Reported Outcome Measure (FROM-16) is a questionnaire that measures the impact on the quality of life of an adult family member or partner resulting from having a person (of any age) in a family with any disease or condition, across all of medicine.

It is self-explanatory and can be simply handed to the patient’s family member/partner who is asked to fill it in without the need for detailed explanation.

FROM-16 has 16 simple questions, based on extensive interviews with 140 family members, across 26 different medical specialties. It can be used across all fields of medicine.

View the Latest publication on FROM-16 severity band scores.

Who can use it

FROM-16 can be completed by any adult who has a family member or partner with any health condition or disease.

This questionnaire can be used in a range of settings by clinicians, pharmaceutical companies, with-profit organisations, students or researchers.

Learn more about who can use this questionnaire and how to administer it.

Apply for a license

Please note that for the FROM-16 questionnaire all requests for information have to be submitted through the ePROVIDE^TM platform.

Submitting a request is completely free of charge and will ensure an optimized service. It does not commit you to purchasing a questionnaire.

1. Go to Submit a request.
2. If you haven't registered yet, you'll be asked to sign up for free.
3. Complete the request form. You may attach documents if need be.

Age range

FROM-16 can be used by any adult, aged 18 years or older. The person in the family with the health condition or disease can be any age, from infancy to the very elderly.

Time for completion

FROM-16 is usually completed in two minutes.

Recall period

The questions of FROM-16 are designed to record the current impact on quality of life.

Download the questionnaire

Different language versions

This zip file contains the questionnaires in different languages, along with the translation certificates. Find out more about our translation and linguistic validation process, and what to do if you'd like to create a new translation.

Note that the only difference between the original UK English version and the USA English version is that in Question 11, UK English is 'holiday', USA English is 'vacation'.

How to score it

FROM-16 has 16 questions. Each question has three response options:

• Not at all - score 0
• A little - score 1
• A lot - score 2

The total score range (FROM-16-total) is 0-32.

The questions in FROM-16 are divided into two parts (domains):

• Emotional (the first 6 questions, maximum score of 12)
• Personal and Social Life (the last 10 questions, maximum score of 20).

The FROM-16 score can also be reported as two separate scores:

• FROM-emotional, score range 0-12
• FROM-personal, score range 0-20.

Meaning of scores

The higher the total score, the greater the effect on the family member’s quality of life. Band descriptors have recently been published:

0–1 = no effect on the quality of life of family member
2–8 = small effect on family member
9–16 = moderate effect on family member
17–25 = very large effect on family member
26–32 = extremely large effect on family member

View the publication 'Meaning of Family Reported Outcome Measure (FROM-16) severity score bands: a cross-sectional online study in the UK'

Interpreting incorrectly completed questionnaires

There is a high success rate of accurate completion of the questionnaire.

However, sometimes subjects do make mistakes. If one question is left unanswered, this is scored 0 and the scores are summed and expressed as usual out of a maximum of 32.

If two or more questions are left unanswered, the questionnaire is not scored. If two or more response options are ticked, the response option with the highest score should be recorded.

If there is a response between two tick boxes, the lower of the two score options should be recorded.

Copyright and registration

The Family Reported Outcome Measure (FROM-16) is copyright worldwide, so you must not change the format, wording or design of the questionnaire.

The copyright statement must always be reprinted at the end of every copy of this questionnaire in whatever language:
© S. Salek, A.Y. Finlay, M.K.A. Basra, C.J. Golics, May 2012.

By agreement, the University owns and administers all copyright matters relating to FROM-16.

FROM-16© was developed by researchers from the Centre for Pharmacoeconomic Research, School of Pharmacy and Pharmaceutical Sciences, and from the Department of Dermatology and Wound Healing, School of Medicine.

The USA Library of Congress Registration
Number: TXu001827532
Registration Date: 31 August 2012
Authors: Professor Sam Salek, Professor Andrew Y Finlay, Dr Mohammad K A Basra and Dr Catherine J Golics.

Original publications

Salek S, Finlay AY, Basra MKA, Golics CJ. The development and validation of the Family Reported Outcome Measure (FROM-16)© to assess the impact of disease on the partner or family member. Quality of Life Research 2014; 23: 317-26.

Shah R, Finlay AY, Salek SM, et al.
Meaning of Family Reported Outcome Measure (FROM-16) severity score bands: a cross-sectional online study in the UK
BMJ Open 2023;13:e066168. doi: 10.1136/bmjopen-2022-066168

Other key references

• Golics CJ, Basra MK, Finlay AY, Salek S. The impact of disease on family members: a critical aspect of medical care. J R Soc Med 2013; 106: 399-407.
• Golics, CJ, Salek MS, Basra MKA, Finlay AY. The quality of life of family members of patients is greatly affected: an experience from 26 specialties. International Journal of General Medicine 2013; 6: 787-98.
• Chantarasap P, Johns NP, Pairojkul S, Sookprasert A, Wirasorn K, Cheawchanwattana A, Salek S, Subongkot S.  Validation of the Thai version of the family reported outcome measure (FROM-16)© to assess the impact of disease on the partner or family members of patients with cancer.  Health Qual Life Outcomes. 2019 Feb 8;17(1):32.
• Raja A, Wood F, Joshi HB. The impact of urinary stone disease and their treatment on patients' quality of life: a qualitative study. Urolithiasis. 2020;48(3):227-34
• Wojcik E, Reszke R, Otlewska A, Matusiak L, Ali FM, Finlay AY, Szepietowski JC. Family Reported Outcome Measure -16 (FROM-16): creation, reliability and reproducibility of the Polish language version. Acta Dermato-Venereologica 2020 Jul 28; 100(14): adv00219.
• Brittain E, Muirhead N, Finlay AY, Vyas J.  Myalgic encephalomyelitis/chronic fatigue syndrome (ME/CFS): major impact on lives of both patients and family members. Medicina (Kaunas) 2021 Jan 7;57(1):E43. doi: 10.3390/medicina57010043.
• Elsner SA, Salek SS, Finlay AY, Hagemeier A, Bottomley CJ, Katalinic A, Waldmann A. Validation of the German version of the Family reported Outcome Measure (FROM-16) to assess the impact of disease on the partner or family member. Health Qual Life Outcomes. 2021 Mar 24;19(1):106.
• Shah R, Ali FM, Nixon SJ, Ingram JR, Salek SM, Finlay AY. Measuring the impact of COVID-19 on the quality of life of the survivors, partners and family members: a cross-sectional international online survey.
  BMJ Open. 2021 May 25;11(5):e047680. doi: 10.1136/bmjopen-2020-047680.PMID: 34035105 Free article.
• Oh HY, Shin YS. Psychometric Properties of the Korean Family Reported Outcome Measure for Family Members of Patients With Acquired Brain Injury. Journal of Neuroscience Nursing. 2021 Dec 1;53(6):256-61
• Vyas J, Muirhead N, Singh R, Ephgrave R, Finlay AY. Impact of myalgic encephalomyelitis/chronic fatigue syndrome (ME/CFS) on the quality of life of people with ME/CFS and their partners and family members: an online cross-sectional survey. BMJ Open. 2022 May 2;12(5):e058128. doi: 10.1136/bmjopen-2021-058128. Free article.

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