Hu Mengyao, Freedman Vicki A, Ehrlich Joshua R, Reed Nicholas S, Billington Catherine, Kasper Judith D
Assistant Research Scientist with the Survey Research Center, Institute for Social Research, University of Michigan-Ann Arbor, Ann Arbor, MI, USA.
Research Professor with the Survey Research Center, Institute for Social Research, University of Michigan-Ann Arbor, Ann Arbor, MI, USA.
J Surv Stat Methodol. 2021 Feb 14;9(2):309-334. doi: 10.1093/jssam/smaa044. eCollection 2021 Apr.
Maintenance of visual and auditory function is important for preventing the onset of activity limitations and preserving quality of life in later life. To date, national panel studies focused on health and aging have mostly collected subjective (self-reported) measures of visual and auditory function. The National Health and Aging Trends Study (NHATS), a study of Medicare beneficiaries ages sixty-five and older, recently developed a protocol for measuring objective visual and auditory function for its annual, in-home data collection conducted by trained interviewers. The protocol includes three vision tests-distance and near acuity and contrast sensitivity-and one hearing test-pure-tone audiometry-conducted using a tablet platform with results recorded in a scannable booklet. To identify operational issues and evaluate data quality for the proposed set of vision and hearing tests, NHATS incorporated a pilot study into its 2019 round ( = 417 participants and = 9 interviewers). Using these pilot study data, the objectives of this paper are to: (1) describe the NHATS protocols to collect objective measures of visual and auditory function; (2) evaluate the quality of the data collected; and (3) assess whether results are influenced by interviewers. We found that respondents were highly likely to participate, with cooperation rates for each test about 90 percent. Data were high quality, with low rates of missingness, test results significantly associated with age and self-reported items, and percentages with poor vision or hearing consistent with prior population-based studies. Objective measures were more likely than self-reports to classify participants as having visual and auditory impairments and had stronger relationships with demographic correlates. Interviewer effects were small and not statistically significant in this small sample. Results of this study have demonstrated that objective visual and auditory functioning can be successfully incorporated into an interviewer-administered home-based protocol.
维持视觉和听觉功能对于预防活动受限的发生以及保持晚年生活质量至关重要。迄今为止，专注于健康与衰老的全国性专题研究大多收集了视觉和听觉功能的主观（自我报告）测量数据。“国家健康与衰老趋势研究”（NHATS）是一项针对65岁及以上医疗保险受益人的研究，最近制定了一项方案，用于在由经过培训的访员进行的年度居家数据收集中测量客观视觉和听觉功能。该方案包括三项视力测试——远视力和近视力以及对比敏感度——和一项听力测试——纯音听力测定——使用平板电脑平台进行，结果记录在可扫描的手册中。为了识别操作问题并评估所提议的视力和听力测试数据集的数据质量，NHATS在其2019年的调查轮次中纳入了一项试点研究（n = 417名参与者和n = 9名访员）。利用这些试点研究数据，本文的目标是：（1）描述NHATS收集客观视觉和听觉功能测量数据的方案；（2）评估所收集数据的质量；（3）评估结果是否受访员影响。我们发现，受访者参与的可能性很高，每项测试的合作率约为90%。数据质量很高，缺失率很低，测试结果与年龄和自我报告项目显著相关，视力或听力不佳的百分比与先前基于人群的研究一致。客观测量比自我报告更有可能将参与者归类为有视觉和听觉障碍，并且与人口统计学相关因素的关系更强。在这个小样本中，访员效应很小且无统计学意义。本研究结果表明，客观视觉和听觉功能可以成功纳入由访员实施的居家方案中。
