Developing the Premonitory Urges for Tic Disorders Scale-Revised (PUTS-R)

Patients with Gilles de la Tourette syndrome (GTS) or chronic tic disorders frequently experience premonitory urges prior to tics. The 'Premonitory Urges for Tic Disorders Scale' (PUTS) is commonly used in order to assess urge severity in patients with tics. Several studies suggest that the PUTS might measure more than one dimension of urges. These include the quality and severity of premonitory urges.

This study aims to replicate and extend previous findings concerning the psychometric properties of the PUTS and its underlying dimensions in a large sample of 241 patients with GTS including both adults (n = 93; mean age = 34.2 ± 12.84; 73 male) and minors (n = 148; mean age = 11.8 ± 2.86; 123 male), pooled from three different recruitment sites.

Data analysis confirmed good reliability across the PUTS items for both minors and adults and acceptable item characteristics for items 2-8. A factor analysis of items 1-8 confirmed the existence of two factors in both age groups.

The results suggest that the PUTS might benefit from several further small modifications, such as rephrasing items 1 and 9 to increase convergence with the overall construct of the scale. Finally, we propose a revised version of the PUTS, consisting of two subscales: one for urge severity and another one for urge quality by including several new items.