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How early should your child's hearing be tested? Soon after birth, according to the nation's hearing and
communication experts. If that answer surprises you, consider this: Every year, about 12,000 babies in
this country are born with hearing problems. Many of these children will not be diagnosed and treated
until after they are 2 years old. By then, they will have missed out on key years of stimulation of the
hearing centers in their brains. As a result, they could have problems developing speech and language
skills that could affect them the rest of their lives, especially in school or at work. Early detection,
follow-up and treatment of hearing problems in newborns, however, can prevent many of these
communication problems, according to an expert panel convened by the National Institute on Deafness
and Other Communication Disorders (NIDCD), one component of the National Institutes of Health.
Now that advances in technology allow more precise and more accurate testing of infants' hearing, the
panel said, all newborns should be screened--universal screening--in the hospital or birthing center
before they are discharged. Ideally, infants should be tested before they are three months old, so that any
necessary treatment can begin before 6 months of age--the crucial period in a baby's life for speech and
language development.
In response to the panel's recommendations, NIDCD launched "Silence Isn't Always Golden," a
nationwide campaign to increase the awareness of detecting early hearing loss. NIDCD collaborated with
NIH's Office of Research on Minority Health and the National Medical Association.
The panel recommended several low-cost methods for universal newborn screening, including: Auditory
Brainstem Responses (ABR) and Otoacoustic Emissions (OAE). Both tests are painless and take only
minutes to administer.
In the ABR test, sound is introduced to the baby's ears through tiny headphones while the baby is
sleeping. Three small discs placed usually on the baby's head measure whether the baby's brain is
detecting the sounds. The whole process takes about 5 minutes if the baby is quiet and cooperative.
The OAE test works differently. OAEs are very faint, but detectable sounds produced by most normal
ears. Although a person cannot hear his or her own emissions, tiny sensitive microphones placed in the ear
canal can measure the sounds. During the OAE screeing, sound is introduced through a small flexible
probe inserted into the sleeping baby's ear. A microphone inside the probe detects the emissions produced
by the baby's ear in response to the sound. No emissions are detected from an infant who cannot hear.
"Silence Isn't Always Golden" has handy checklists to help parents monitor their child's hearing and
reactions to sound from birth to 36 months of age, along with a glossary of terms doctors may use when
talking to parents about a child's hearing. --a report from the NIH Word on Health, June 1998
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For free copies of the publication "Silence Isn't Always Golden" (NIH publication #95-4040)--available in English, Spanish and Vietnamese--call or write:
NIDCD Information Clearinghouse
1 Communication Avenue
Bethesda, MD 20892-3456
Phone: 1-800-241-1044 (voice)
1-800-241-1055 (TTY)
For more information on this article, reporters can contact:
National Institute on Deafness and
Other Communication Disorders
Information Office
Building 31, Room 3C-35
Bethesda, Maryland 20892
Phone: 301-496-7243
301-402-0252 (TTY)
Fax: 301-402-0018
Carla Garnett,
Writer and Editor, NIH
Phone: 301-496-2125
Fax: 301-402-1485
E-mail: cg9s@nih.gov
Additional information on hearing, speech and language can be found on NIDCD's
home page at <http://www.nih.gov/nidcd/>.
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