Assessing Babies' Ability to Hear

Each year, irreversible hearing loss is reported in about 12,000 babies in the U.S. alone. Of every 1,000 babies born, three have one or the other type of hearing loss

The type of hearing loss can be so diverse that in some cases it can be just a gentle feeling of hearing trouble to severe cases of being unable to hear anything. A universal approach to treating children with hearing loss is giving them therapy of some kind and providing them hearing aids.

In the most extreme cases, cochlear implants remain the only option. Cochlear implants send signals directly to the auditory nerve even when a damaged part of the ear is unable to respond even to amplified sound coming from hearing aids. The original level of hearing can never be brought back even after using the best of these devices.

Doctors will always recommend that babies be screened as soon as possible after birth. The first few months of a baby?s life can be very critical in developing language skills and hence the chosen therapies need to be started within the first six months.

A new procedure is proving very helpful in detecting hearing loss in babies immediately after birth. If the hearing loss is detected within the first six months after birth, it is possible to use modern day procedures that ensure language development almost on par with other children.

The hearing problem in most children goes undetected till they are about 22 to 26 months old. Quite often, hearing problems do not get detected till they manifest themselves as either speech related issues or language development problems.

Before newborn babies are allowed to leave hospital, they are subjected to a new procedure that is able to identify hearing problems

A newborn baby?s hearing ability is determined by Otacoustic Emissions. A soft probe is used for delivering sounds into the ear canal. Inside the same probe is a microphone that captures an echo produced by the cochlea, or inner ear. Compared to any other procedure that would take over 10 minutes, this method requires just 10 seconds for each ear.

Doctors recommend the Auditory Brainstem Response test for babies who fail the OAE test. The ABR test is all about measuring the response of the auditory nerve to sounds created by a disposable earphone and detected by three painless electrodes placed on the baby?s head and shoulders.

Testing each ear does not take more than 15 minutes.

Babies must be asleep when these tests are run. Speech and language development problems, noticed around the age of 2 years, happen to be the first symptoms that lead to the detection of hearing defects.

Screening all babies will enable medical experts to attend to those who need further tests and treatment. Language development of children while at school as well as the rest of their lives could be impacted by this.

Diagnostic testing by an audiologist is required for babies who fail both these tests. Roughly two percent of the babies need to be sent to an audiologist for diagnostic testing.

Two year old infants can also be given amplification equipment to tide over their hearing loss. To ensure normal development, it is important that these children are given early help.

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