Pure tone audiometry: comparison of general practice and hospital services

Pure tone audiometry was obtained for both ears of 32 children by a general practitioner using a simple audiometer in his surgery, and by audiometricians in a hospital department on the same day. Comparing the worst hearing threshold at any of the three tested frequencies, the general practitioner did not find any ears to hear more than 10 dB better than the hospital (no false negatives). However, there were six false positives (9%) where the general practitioner identified an apparent hearing loss of greater than 15 dB. It is concluded that pure tone audiometry could be carried out accurately in the practice.