TAPS
ValidatedTobacco, Alcohol, Prescription medication, and other Substance use (TAPS) Tool
Adults (18+)Self, Clinician~4 min33 questions
The TAPS Tool Part 1 is a 4-item screening for tobacco use, alcohol use, prescription medication misuse, and illicit substance use in the past year. Part 2 is a brief assessment for tobacco, alcohol, and illicit substance use and prescription medication misuse in the PAST 3 MONTHS ONLY. Part 2 questions appear only for the substances you report in Part 1.
Report details · optional
Shown on the report and stored with the screening record. Use initials or a code, not full names.
Answers, results and report details are recorded by OpenScreener to monitor and improve the service. Privacy
About this screener — evidence, source
Part 1 is a four-item frequency screen covering tobacco, heavy drinking, illicit drugs and non-medical use of prescription medication in the past 12 months. Any answer other than “Never” opens Part 2, brief yes/no questions about the past 3 months for each substance class, which give a substance-specific score: 0 = no use in the past 3 months, 1 = problem use, 2+ = higher risk.
Evidence · validated
In 2,000 adult primary-care patients (CTN-0059), against a modified WHO CIDI: for problem use at a cut-off of 1+, sensitivity 0.93 and specificity 0.87 for tobacco, and 0.74 / 0.79 for alcohol; for illicit and prescription drugs sensitivity ranged from 0.82 (marijuana) to 0.63 (sedatives) with specificity ≥ 0.93. Self- and interviewer-administered versions performed similarly. Sensitivity for substance use disorder at 2+ was lower, adequate (> 70%) only for tobacco, alcohol and marijuana (McNeely et al., 2016).
Source & licence
McNeely J, Wu LT, Subramaniam G, Sharma G, Cathers LA, Svikis D, et al. Performance of the Tobacco, Alcohol, Prescription Medication, and Other Substance Use (TAPS) Tool for substance use screening in primary care patients. Ann Intern Med. 2016;165(10):690–699. NIDA Clinical Trials Network, TAPS Tool Parts I and II, Web Version 2.0 (09-19-17).
Licence: Public domain — the NIDA CTN Dissemination Library states “The instrument is available for use in the public domain; research was supported by the National Institute on Drug Abuse.”
Wording from the CTN TAPS Tool Parts I and II form (V2). Part 2 is gated per substance class as in NIDA’s online TAPS tool (nida.nih.gov/taps2). The form’s free-text follow-up for “other” drugs is not included.
Official source ↗