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How to check if newborn can hear


Can Your Baby Hear You? Your Baby Passed The Hearing Screening

A brochure is available in Portable Document Format (PDF) in several translations:

  • English; Arabic; Bengali; Chinese; Haitian Creole; Italian; Korean; Polish; Russian; Spanish; Yiddish

Hearing Screening

Baby's Name: _____________________________________________________________

passed the Newborn Hearing screening in both ears on

Date: ___________________________________________________________________

Screening Method: __ OAE __ ABR

Your Baby Passed

Your baby has passed the hearing screening in both ears. The screening that was used was either Otoacoustic Emissions (OAE) or Auditory Brainstem Responses (ABR), or both.

How Your Baby's Hearing Was Checked

A trained person checked your baby's hearing. Either:

  • Your baby had a tiny microphone placed in his or her ear (OAE), or,
  • Your baby wore special earphones and had tiny pads placed on his or her head (ABR).

Then, soft sounds were played and your baby's hearing was measured.

The screening suggests that your baby is most likely hearing now. However, this does not mean that your baby will never lose his or her hearing. A small number of babies who pass the newborn hearing screening may develop hearing loss later in life. That's why it's important to pay attention to your child's hearing.

Why Was My Baby's Hearing Checked?

Hearing is very important. Your baby needs to hear sounds to learn how to speak and learn about the world. Hearing is very important in the early months to prevent possible problems with language or What Causes Hearing Loss? sometimes we won't know what causes hearing loss. Other times it is caused by: • Deafness which runs in families • Ear infections • meningitis • Other serious infections Talk to your baby's doctor or clinic if you have any questions or concerns. schoolwork later on. That's why, in New York state, all babies have their hearing checked.

What Causes Hearing Loss?

Sometimes we won't know what causes hearing loss. Other times it is caused by:

  • Deafness which runs in families
  • Ear infections
  • Meningitis
  • Other serious infections

Talk to your baby's doctor or clinic if you have any questions or concerns.

Check Your Child's Hearing and Speech

Even if your baby passed the screening, it is still important to check your baby's hearing often. The list below* will help you keep track of your baby's hearing as he or she grows. Good hearing helps babies do the things on this checklist. If you have any concerns about your child's hearing, at any age, call your baby's doctor or clinic.

Good Hearing Checklist*

Birth to 3 Months
  • Becomes quiet when around everyday voices or sounds
  • Reacts to loud sounds: baby startles, blinks, stops sucking, cries, or wakes up
  • Makes soft sounds when awake: baby gurgles
3 to 6 Months
  • Turns eyes or head toward sounds: voices, toys that make noise, a barking dog
  • Starts to make speech-like sounds: "ga," "ooh," "ba," and p, b, m sounds
  • Reacts to a change in your tone of voice
6 to 9 Months
  • Responds to soft sounds, especially talking
  • Responds to own name and looks when called
  • Understands simple words: "no," "bye-bye," "juice"
  • Babbles: "da da da," "ma ma ma," "ba ba ba"
9 to 12 Months
  • Consistently responds to both soft and loud sounds
  • Repeats single words and copies animal sounds
  • Points to favorite toys or foods when asked
12 to 18 Months
  • Uses 10 or more words
  • Follows simple spoken directions: "get the ball"
  • Points to people, body parts or toys when asked
  • "Bounces" to music
18 to 24 Months
  • Uses 20 or more words
  • Combines two or more words: "more juice," "what's that?"
  • Uses many different consonant sounds at the beginning of words: b, g, m
  • Listens to simple stories and songs
2 to 3 Years
  • Uses sentences with two or three words
  • At 2 years, the child's speech is understood some of the time (25%-50%)
  • At 3 years, the child's speech is understood most of the time (50%-75%)
  • Follows two-step instructions: "get the ball and put it in the box"

Your child's hearing can and should be checked at any age.

  • * Adapted from the California Department of Health Services' checklist.

More Help For Your Baby

If your baby has a hearing loss, or may have a hearing loss, you might need more help. Infants, toddlers with special needs, and their families may get help from the New York state Health Department's Early Intervention Program (EIP). EIP offers hearing screening and testing, and support for you, your baby, and your family. To learn more, call your doctor, clinic, or the EIP in your county or borough.

To learn more about newborn hearing screening or EIP, please call (518) 473-7016.

Visit the Early Intervention Program Web page at:
  • www.health.ny.gov/community/infants_children/ early_intervention/

To reach your local EIP, call:

  • Growing Up Healthy
    24-Hour Hotline
    1-800-522-5006
    TTY: 1-800-655-1789

In New York City, call: 311

Baby Hearing Screening | CDC

The best way to find out if your baby may be deaf or hard of hearing is by a hearing screening. Early diagnosis and intervention will help them reach their full potential.

Thousands of babies are born deaf or hard of hearing each year in the United States. Babies diagnosed early with hearing loss and begin intervention early are more likely to reach their full potential. The best way to find out if your baby may be deaf or hard of hearing is by a simple hearing test, also called a hearing screening.

Why is a hearing screening important for my baby?

Learn more about outcomes associated with early hearing detection and intervention:

Reading Proficiency Trends Following Newborn Hearing Screening Implementation

Frequency of Early Intervention Sessions and Vocabulary Skills in Children with Hearing Loss

Starting from day 1, babies begin to learn language skills by listening to and interacting with those around them. If babies miss these opportunities, their language development can be delayed. Many times, children’s hearing loss is not obvious and can go unnoticed for months or even years.

Hearing screening at birth can determine if your baby may have a hearing loss and if more tests are needed. An early diagnosis is essential to help babies who are deaf or hard of hearing reach their full potential, and allows families to make decisions about the intervention services that are best for their baby’s needs. Early diagnosis of hearing loss and beginning intervention helps to keep children’s development on track and improve their future language and social development.

Your baby probably had a hearing screening

Almost all states, communities, and hospitals now screen newborns for hearing loss before the babies leave the hospital. The hearing screening is easy and painless, and it can determine if more testing is needed. In fact, many babies sleep through the hearing screening, and the test usually takes just a few minutes.

What if my baby did not pass the hearing screening?

Additional testing is the next step to tell if your baby has hearing loss and what type of loss it is. A healthcare professional trained to test hearing, such as an audiologist, will be able to perform more detailed hearing tests. Your baby’s doctor (or an ear, nose, and throat doctor) should perform or order any medical tests needed to find out the cause of the hearing loss.

Making sure your baby gets this additional testing quickly is also important. CDC-funded research shows just how important it is. Children with hearing loss who are identified before 3 months of age, and receive services before 6 months of age, have better vocabularies than those identified or receiving services later. For more information about this research, visit Giving Every Child the Gift of Words

If my baby passed the hearing screening, is everything fine?

Because a newborn baby can pass the hearing screening and still develop a hearing loss later, your baby’s doctor should routinely follow your baby’s general health and development.

For more information, visit CDC’s Early Hearing Detection and Intervention (EHDI) website.

View large image and text description

Where can I go for help?

Every state has a program that works to help make sure that babies who are deaf or hard of hearing are diagnosed early. If you have any concerns about your baby’s hearing, ask the doctor for a hearing test or screening as soon as possible. To learn more about this topic, you can also call toll free 1-800-CDC-INFO or visit the CDC EHDI Program site.

The Centers for Disease and Control and Prevention’s (CDC’s) Early Hearing Detection and Intervention (EHDI) program works with your state to ensure that all babies are screened for hearing loss and receive any needed follow-up tests and services. CDC’s EHDI program supports the ongoing search for new ways to improve services. To learn more about CDC’s important role in helping children who are deaf and hard of hearing, download a fact sheet [439 KB, 2 Pages, 508] and watch a video in American Sign Language.

Does your child hear?

According to statistics, every year in Russia, out of 1,000 healthy newborns, 1 child is born with total deafness. In children born prematurely, with low body weight, with CNS damage, this figure increases by 20 times. However, today, deafness is not a sentence. The main thing is to notice in time and turn to specialists.

Sometimes, walking down the street, we notice people who are gesticulating, turning towards each other. We pass by without thinking about how these people live in the country of the deaf when the world around you is devoid of all sounds, when you cannot hear the cry of a newborn baby, a declaration of love, words of forgiveness, pleas for help. And how does a little, just born man live in the world without a mother's lullaby, without dad's laughter, without a cat's meow, birds singing? How can he live and develop, deprived of hearing? And, if it seems to you that this trouble will bypass you and your loved ones, then I can upset you, this can happen to anyone. There are risk factors for hearing loss:

Adverse family history:

1. Hearing loss at a young age in at least one of the family members.

Adverse maternal history:

1. Toxicosis of the first half of pregnancy and preeclampsia.

2. Infectious and viral diseases of the mother during pregnancy (rubella, measles, herpes zoster, herpes zoster, cytomegalovirus infection, influenza, mumps, toxoplasmosis and other viral infections). nine0003

3. Maternal use of ototoxic drugs during pregnancy.

Unfavorable history of the child's life:

1. Prematurity.

2. Gestational age over 40 weeks.

3. Apgar score at birth 0-3.

4. Birth weight less than 1500 g

5. Neonatal asphyxia

6. Congenital malformations of the maxillofacial skeleton

7. Counted with hearing impairment of the malfunctions of the child

8. Intracranial birth injury

9. The gypoxic-ischemic lesion of the central nervous system

10. The hemolytic disease of the newborn.

11. Hyperbilirubinemia (more than 20 µmol/l).

12. Neonatal meningitis.

13. Treatment with ototoxic drugs

The main thing that every mother should know is that a newborn's hearing is checked at birth. home for 3-4 days. This is for ALL kids. The result must be recorded in the statement: it is: "test passed" or "failed". At this point, in more detail for those who "did not pass the test": dear mothers, it's too early to worry, this does not mean that the child does not hear, it means that you must repeat this test in 1 month at the clinic at the place of residence. There are reasons for not passing this test:

• Sulfur masses (birth lubrication) in the external auditory canal

• Myxoid tissue or exudate in the middle ear

• Damage to the external hair cells

• Test must be done in silence (the test must be performed in silence!)

If, for the second time, the child does not pass the audiological test, he must be sent for an in-depth audiological examination to the audiological center: for children of the Sverdlovsk Region - to the Regional Children's Audiological Center of the MKMC "Bonum". There, experienced specialists will determine the degree of hearing loss, tell your further actions. nine0003

Some babies need hearing aids and need to wear them at a certain time: up to 6 months. And it’s not true that everyone around will say that it’s too early, that you need to wait, that hearing aids spoil your hearing and you need to wear them only in extreme cases! You need to listen to the DOCTOR! After all, delay with hearing aid in the first year of life entails a lag in speech development. If the child does not hear sounds, he does not understand speech, so he will not start talking or will start talking later, with significant impairment. nine0003

Remember that today's hearing aids are not the outdated hearing aids you saw on your grandparents. Modern hearing aid is:

  • Digital audio processing

  • Setting accuracy

  • Multichannel

  • Programmability

  • Multiprogramming

  • Microphone directivity

  • Acoustic management

  • Acoustic Feedback Suppression

  • Noise Cancellation

But, there is a hearing loss that no even the most powerful hearing aid can help: it's deafness! These are terrible words, they are scary to say to the doctor and scary to hear for mom: your child does not hear. And you understand that the best, most beautiful baby in the world will never become a musician (or a doctor, or an actor). Because he is deaf. Is it possible to convey all the grief and despair that covers parents, grandparents. The main thing is that you are not left alone at this moment. Doctors and teachers of the Regional Children's Audiological Center of the MKMC "Bonum" will help you cope with all the difficulties. nine0003

Today, deafness is not a sentence. There is a proven, effective and safe method for the rehabilitation of children with total deafness. This is a cochlear implant.

COCHLEAR IMPLANTATION is a system of measures and technical means aimed at restoring missing physical hearing.

Cochlear Implant Kit consists of two parts: internal and external. Internal (implantable), surgically placed under the scalp and into the cochlea during surgery. The outer part - the speech processor is worn behind the ear or fastened to the baby's clothes. nine0003

How does the cochlear implant system work?

1. The microphone picks up sounds around us and transmits them to the speech processor.

2. The speech processor analyzes sounds and encodes them into a sequence of electrical impulses.

3. The transmitter antenna sends these pulses through intact skin to the cochlear implant.

4. The implant transmits electrical impulses to electrodes in the cochlea, where the auditory nerve fibers are stimulated. nine0003

5. The auditory nerve receives electrical impulses and sends information to the auditory centers of the brain. The brain recognizes the transmitted signals as sound.

Indications for cochlear implantation

Bilateral deep sensorneal deafness (medium threshold of auditory perception at frequencies of 0.5, 1 and 2 kHz more than 95 dB)

· Thresholds of auditory perception in a free sound field using optimally fitting hearing aids exceeding 55 dB at 2-4 kHz

No significant improvement in auditory perception of speech from the use of optimally fitted hearing aids (in children who have had meningitis, this gap can be reduced)

No cognitive problems

No psychological problems 909003

0 6 No serious physical diseases Readiness of parents for a long postoperative rehabilitation period of classes with audiologists and deaf teachers

Contraindications to cochlear implantation are:

· Complete or partial, but significant, screening of the Snail

· Retrookochlear pathology (damage to the auditory nerve, neurinoma of the auditory nerve, etc. )

diseases (chronic renal failure, decompensated heart disease, etc.)

Intellectual disability

Presence of focal pathology in the cortical or subcortical structures of the brain

Lack of desire to work with a deaf teacher for many years after implantation or lack of support from family members and their readiness for long-term rehabilitation work .

The sooner hearing loss is detected, the sooner a cochlear implant can be performed. If the operation was performed early, before the baby learned to speak, then the child's speech may develop spontaneously, in much the same way as their hearing peers. nine0003

The later the operation is done, the more efforts of parents, classes with teachers you will need, the more difficult it is for the child to understand the people around him and learn to speak.

Children are now implanted in their first year of life.

I sincerely believe that several years will pass (for someone 2 years, for someone 3) and your amazing child will come running from the kindergarten and tell you: "Maasya, sya, I'm uncle" which means: "Mommy sit down, I'll give you candy. " And it will be the most pleasant moments of your life. And even though at first only you will understand it, the moment will come when a completely grown-up and beautiful daughter or a smart and strong son, after graduating from school, will kiss you and say in a completely different way: "Thank you for everything, dear mommy." And then you will remember all those people who believed in your strength, who were with you in those difficult first years. So let's become these kind people together and help a deaf child get out of the world of deaf-muteness. Let him hear the world and speak. nine0003

How to understand whether a child hears after birth and whether hearing loss develops as he grows

The senior deaf teacher of the MasterSluh network of medical centers, a specialist in auditory and speech rehabilitation, Natalya Chernaya, tells.

Baby, can you hear me?

Once again about hearing loss

Most of the articles on our site are articles about hearing loss. Let us briefly recall the most basic things you need to know about this disease.

  1. Types of hearing loss: nine0072
  • Sensorineural hearing loss - sound perception is impaired, with this type the cochlea or brain auditory centers are damaged.
  • Conductive hearing loss - sound conduction is impaired. Sometimes it can be corrected by removing an obstacle to the penetration of sounds: sulfuric plug, swelling, etc.
  • Mixed hearing loss - both types are combined.
  1. Experts distinguish four degrees of hearing loss. The classification adopted in Russia and the international one differ by several units of measurement, but the essence is the same - from good hearing and slight loss to complete deafness. nine0072

Standards for determining degrees of hearing loss.

In many cases, poor hearing gets worse over time.

  1. Hearing loss can be congenital or acquired - due to trauma, complications from viral diseases, taking a number of medications, or when the mother had an infection during pregnancy, and this affected the development of the fetus.

Genetic fact. Deafness is not always inherited. Parents with hearing loss can have a hearing child and vice versa. There are families in which mothers and fathers wear hearing aids, but the son or daughter does not. Or the firstborn was born with a hearing impairment, and his younger brother or sister is healthy. There is a so-called "deafness gene", but whether it will be dominant is an individual question. It is determined using special analyzes

Newborn screening - not 100%

This test helps to "catch" possible hearing problems at an early stage, and should be done to babies in maternity hospitals. The study of whether the child hears after birth, is quite simple, is carried out using the OAE method using a special device that does not emit sounds that are unpleasant and harmful to the small patient. The procedure takes several minutes.

But! There are various reasons why screening is not done. There is no equipment for the UAE in the maternity hospital, it is defective or there is no staff who knows how to work on it. Not everyone gives birth in maternity hospitals. Someone is an adherent of childbirth at home and fundamentally does not show the baby to doctors. There are situations when a newborn immediately after birth needed emergency treatment and doctors had no time for screening. nine0003

Screening, although an indicative test, is incomplete. He says only "yes" - he hears or "no" - he does not hear. And what kind of hearing impairment a newborn has, otoacoustic emission will not show.

There are reasons why a test may give a negative result, and this is not always a hearing pathology. For example:

  • hardware failure;

  • incorrectly selected insert for the probe or its loose fit during the procedure; nine0003

  • ear obstruction (fluid, wax, neonatal otitis, etc.)

If your baby did not have an evoked otoacoustic emission (TAE) test immediately after birth, or if the test was negative, get a hearing test as soon as possible. You can find out the address of the nearest center and sign up for a consultation with an audiologist-otorhinolaryngologist on the contact page of the MasterSluh center.
nine0185 Four signs of possible hearing loss in the baby, which should alert parents

The first - at three or four months, the baby does not respond well to the sounds and voice of the mother. At this age, the child can and should, to the best of his ability, perceive the world around him.

  • If unexpected sharp and loud sounds are heard, for example, the TV is turned on or the phone rings, the baby closes his eyes, begins to cry, get scared, express displeasure. nine0003

  • Perceives mother's voice, its intonation - calms down from mother's voice or smiles when she hears it.

If none of these are present or are poorly expressed, consult an ENT or audiologist to see if and how the child hears.

Second - poor speech development in the first year of life, starting from 6 months. Parents usually notice this problem much later - by the age of three or even four, when the baby does not speak or pronounce sounds and words very poorly. nine0003

In fact, you can understand the features of speech development by the way a child mutters: ma-ma-ma, pa-pa-pa. All babies do this, even the deaf. Gradually, the baby’s sound complex is replenished with new words “ba-ba-ba”, “pa-pa-pa”, while in a hearing-impaired or deaf child it remains the same.

By the age of one, the baby does not just say “ma-ma-ma” or “pa-pa-pa”, but addresses these sounds specifically to mom or dad. Deaf children don't do this, they just draw sounds, the same "ma" is said to everyone. nine0003

In general, it is worth paying attention to speech norms, although they are now being revised, considering them obsolete. It's still a guideline. There is no need to fanatically follow the postulate that by the age of one and a half years the baby's vocabulary must be 100 words (no more, no less), but this stock must be replenished for sure.

Third - at an older age, when a child begins to lag behind peers in a kindergarten or other children's group, he has problems with speech. Hearing, speech and general development are directly related, the younger age is critical in this regard. If there are hearing problems, it means that speech will suffer and the child will not have the opportunity to develop properly. nine0003

Now qualified speech therapists understand that speech problems are primarily related to hearing and refer to an audiologist to find out how the child hears.

In order for a child with hearing loss to master speech, he must first of all hear well! Not only to perceive sounds, but to be able to listen and understand speech. This is already a job for a teacher of the deaf.

The fourth sign , which will help you to know that the child is hard of hearing. The baby does not respond if you address him, for example from another room. Many adults attribute this to inattention, preoccupation with the game. May be so. But there is a possibility of developing hearing loss. The child simply does not hear you! You can understand this for sure only at an appointment with an ENT or audiologist. nine0003

Parents need to remember that the more severe the defect, the more noticeable it is, and any deviation of the child from normal behavior is a reason to contact a specialist. Even if the child does not switch attention, this can also be a signal of a problem in the development of one of the systems.

Who is at risk?

Actually, everything. No one can guarantee that a person, even if born with 100% hearing, will not develop hearing loss at any point in life. nine0003

Genetic disorders are not immediately identified. If the baby was born without anomalies of the auditory system, this does not mean that any hereditary pathology will not appear later. And parents notice this late, already by the age of 3-4, and they pay attention not to the fact that the child does not hear well, but to the fact that he does not speak well or does not speak at all.

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