115 Ear complaints in a general population; the Normative data of the Otology Questionnaire Amsterdam in the Netherlands 6 Due to the optimal distribution of ages in the sample, we were able to model the effect of age with reasonable accuracy across the whole age range using a flexible function (spline), avoiding the need for arbitrary cut-offs between age groups in the normative scores. Details for the estimated models are available in Figure 3.1, 3.2 and 3.3. A lower scores implies less burden of this specific complaint, higher scores imply higher burden of complaint. In the complaints ‘ear itch’, ‘dizziness’ and ‘hearing loss’ in Figure 3 overall low scores in both genders are measured with a decrease of scores when people get older. In the same figure 3 in ‘ear pressure’, ‘ear pain’ and ‘ear discharge’, higher sores are measured in younger aged participants, equally in both genders and with a decrease of scores when people get older in these scores as well. The final two graphics in figure 3 ‘tinnitus’ and ‘loss of taste’ show relative high scores, measured with differences between genders (as based on Akaike Information Criterion). The tinnitus subscale scores are high in younger aged participants with an initial decrease of scores until the age of 48 in men and 46 in female before increasing again. Men have higher tinnitus scores then female over the entire age span. Gender differences were found in the loss of taste data as well, with males having higher scores and thus experiencing a higher burden of the loss of taste in the general population compared to females. Tables with accurate data by age and gender of respectively the calculated mean, 75th and 95th percentile scores (supplements S3-5) can be send to you upon reasonable request. A R-script, along with the two files oqua.rds and finalModels.rds, can be used to provide the desired quantiles for each OQUA subscale. These files can also be obtained upon reasonable request.
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