OBJECTIVE: We developed a self-administered, health status measure to monitor and assess the functional status and response to treatment in an outpatient population of individuals with schizophrenia. METHOD: 442 adult consumers with schizophrenia (61% male, 39% female) were recruited from >50 sites in the Massachusetts mental health system. Consumers completed 7 administrations of a set of two assessment measures over a 9-month period: a 75-item prototype questionnaire used to sample subjective and objective consumer and the BASIS-32, a 32-item mental health status measure. Several staff assessments of consumer status were also completed at each administration. RESULTS: The original consumer battery of 107 items was reduced and modified to 46 using correlation, variance, item, and factor analyses. The 7 constructs comprising the 46 items included – in decreasing order of contribution to the total variance of the factor analysis - mental health, work and leisure, self-concept, activities of daily living, physical function, interpersonal satisfaction, and medication effects. These 7 constructs explained 63% of the variance, with Cronbach’s alpha of 0.94. Test-retest reliability was approximately 0.8. Item to total score correlations were all significant and ranged from 0.24 to 0.68. The above set of 46 items was then augmented by 5 additional items gleaned from consumer and expert panel assessments of item importance to yield a 51-item instrument called the Health Status-S Survey. CONCLUSION: The Health Status-S Survey appears practical in a community-based population of individuals with schizophrenia. The Survey is now being validated in 5 states - Arizona, Massachusetts, South Carolina, Washington, and Wisconsin - using 4 administrations over 3 months for 300 consumers per state.