Abstract

Addressing the lack of self-report tools for acute stress disorder assessment, the authors aimed at translating and evaluating the Acute Stress Disorder Scale (ASDS) into German. The scale was applied to parents of children following cardiopulmonary bypass surgery (n = 61), and to patients with an acute cardiac event (n = 52) within one month of illness-related trauma. Indices of reliability, construct, and predictive validity with established measures of posttraumatic stress, anxiety, and depression suggest that the German ASDS is a psychometrically sound and valid instrument.