Five-part questionnaire for hypermobility (5PQ)
Five yes/no questions that pick up hypermobility, including hypermobility you used to have
The five-part questionnaire was published by Alan Hakim and Rodney Grahame in 2003 as a quick way to identify generalised joint hypermobility without a physical examination. It asks five yes/no questions, and two or more "yes" answers is a positive screen. In the original study of 212 hypermobile patients and 57 controls it had a sensitivity of 84% and a specificity of 89%; a replication cohort gave 84% and 80%.
Its particular value is the phrase "or could you ever". The Beighton score measures joint range today, and joints stiffen with age, injury, and surgery. Someone who was markedly hypermobile at 20 can fail the Beighton cut-off at 45 while still carrying the connective tissue that caused it. The 5PQ was written to capture that history, which is why the 2017 hEDS criteria use it: if your Beighton score is exactly one point below the age cut-off, a positive 5PQ makes up the difference for Criterion 1.
It takes under a minute. If you screen positive, the next steps are the Beighton score for today's joint range and, if hEDS is a question, the 2017 hEDS criteria checker, which uses both.
Your 5PQ result
Understanding your result
Two or more "yes" answers is the published threshold for a positive screen. In Hakim and Grahame's clinic cohorts it correctly classified 84% of people; in a Swedish general-population study (Glans 2020) sensitivity was 91% and specificity 75% against an age-adjusted Beighton cut-off, and in a pregnancy cohort specificity fell to 62%. Roughly one in five UK adults screen positive in postal surveys. In other words, a positive 5PQ is common and is a prompt for assessment, not a finding in itself.
Under the 2017 hEDS criteria, the 5PQ is only applied when the Beighton score is exactly one point below the cut-off (6 before puberty, 5 up to age 50, 4 over 50). If you have not measured your Beighton score, the illustrated Beighton tool takes a few minutes. The hEDS criteria checker then applies both rules together with the rest of the criteria.
Hypermobility is more common in people with POTS and other forms of orthostatic intolerance. If that describes you, the NASA lean test and the COMPASS-31 cover the autonomic side.
This is not a diagnosis. Discuss your results with your doctor.