Up to two-thirds of adults older than 70 are hard of hearing, but since hearing loss comes on gradually, people often aren’t aware they have a problem. What’s worse, doctors don’t routinely check for hearing loss, so it’s usually up to patients to identify it, says Justin S. Golub, MD, MS, assistant professor of otolaryngology-head and neck surgery at New York-Presbyterian/Columbia University Irving Medical Center in New York.

To help people determine whether they have a hearing problem, the National Institute on Deafness and Other Communication Disorders created the following questionnaire:

• Do you have a problem hearing over the telephone?
• Do you have trouble following the conversation when two or more people are talking at the same time?
• Do people complain that you turn the volume of the radio or television up too high?
• Do you have to strain to understand conversation?
• Do you have trouble hearing when there’s a lot of background noise?
• Do you find yourself asking people to repeat themselves?
• Do many people you talk to seem to mumble or not speak clearly?
• Do you misunderstand what others are saying and respond inappropriately?
• Do you have trouble understanding the speech of women and children?
• Do people get annoyed because you misunderstand what they say?

If you answered “yes” to three or more of the questions, it’s a good idea to ask your doctor for a referral to an audiologist for a formal hearing test.