Self-assessment and impairment in adult/elderly hearing screening--recent data and new perspectives.

Because self-assessment measures are helpful in identifying handicap/communication difficulties, they have an important place in hearing screening protocols for adult/elderly persons. When impairment is used as the criterion, questionnaire results can be used to calculate sensitivity, specificity, predictive values, and efficiency for a variety of fences. Findings are summarized for 2825 persons on three different questionnaires that reveal adequate, reasonably similar, and predictable relationships between impairment and self-assessment findings. However, evidence on "deny-ers" (persons with impairment who deny their handicap) and "complainers" (persons who complain about handicap but have no impairment) are also presented. These latter findings show a strong rationale for using self-assessment measures in their own right, and not simply as an alternate, less effective method for measuring pure-tone impairment.