The effectiveness of parental questionnaires in the assessment of speech-language and auditory function in children

Objective: This study investigates the use of a parental questionnaire to determine its effectiveness as a screening tool in identifying speech-language and/or auditory impairments in children. Patients and Methods: Parents completed speech-language (n = 36) or audiology (n = 23) questionnaires prior to their child's speech-language and/or auditory evaluations. The speech-language and audiology evaluations were conducted by clinicians at three different universities not familiar with the administration and scoring of the parental questionnaires. A research assistant coded the results of the speech-language and audiology evaluations. Statistical analysis was used to determine if any aspects of the parents' evaluation of their child's speech, language, or hearing correlated with the speech-language pathologists'/audiologists' assessment. The results of the analyses would indicate whether parental reports are a reliable alternative to professionals' assessment. Results: The speech-language questionnaires for children aged 2-5 years revealed the parents' perception of their children speaking 3-word sentences significantly (p < 0.05) corresponded to the children's comprehension and expression skills. The results from the auditory questionnaires revealed that reports of a child's ear pain were (p < 0.05) correlated with auditory dysfunction. Conclusions: These questionnaires can potentially be used in low-income countries where professional resources are scarce and there are barriers to identifying children with speech-language and/or auditory impairment.