2.3.2. Short Health Anxiety Inventory (SHAI)

The Short Health Anxiety Inventory (SHAI) is an 18-item scale designed to evaluate anxiety in two components of hypochondriasis: probability of disease and negative disease consequences. Each of the 18 items contains four statements of which respondents choose one that best describes their feelings over the past 6 months. The responses are scored on a 4-point scale where: 0—no symptoms, 1—mild symptoms, 2—severe symptoms, and 3—very severe symptoms. A cut-off score of 20 was optimal for detecting a severe form of health anxiety, providing the best balance between specificity and sensitivity [20,21].

### 2.3.3. Generalised Anxiety Disorder Assessment (GAD-7)

The GAD-7 is a 7-item scale that is based on the Likert scale. It can be used when evaluating the level of anxiety and the risk of generalised anxiety disorder (GAD). The questions included in the survey evaluate the respondent's feeling of anxiety, tension, nervousness, ability to control these feelings, how easily they appear and how problematic it is to relax. The respondent can obtain 0–3 points for each item, depending on the selected response, i.e., the frequency with which each problem occurs in the respondent (0—not at all; 1—several days; 2—more than half the days; 3—nearly every day). The evaluation concerns the past 14 days. The scores of 5, 10, and 15 indicate mild, moderate, and severe anxiety, respectively. The score of at least 10 indicates that generalised anxiety disorder is very likely [22].
