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Universal Neonatal Hearing Screening - a Necessity and not a Choice
Authors: Saikat Samaddar, Swagatam Banerjee, Sanjoy Kumar Ghosh, Subhra Bhattacharya, Diptanshu Mukherjee, Sirshak Dutta
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ABSTRACT
Introduction
Congenital deafness in a child is often missed. Several distraction tests have evolved over time to diagnose congenital deafness.
However, these are of limited value in the era of Evoked Response Audiometry. The study was conducted to compare the result of
universal neonatal hearing screening (UNHS) in high risk and non-high risk neonates using Otoacoustic Emission (OAE) and
Brainstem Evoked Response Audiometry (BERA).
Materials And Methods
A study was conducted over a time period of three months at a tertiary care institute to screen all live neonates for congenital
hearing impairment using OAE, followed up by BERA, if required.
Result
1182 neonates were screened for hearing impairment. 336 were in high risk group and the rest in non-high risk group. Nine
neonates turned out to have abnormal BERA results (absence of wave V). Six of them were high risk babies and the rest three
were non-high risk ones.
Discussion
33.33% of congenital deaf population detected by UNHS belong to the Non High Risk group. Studies across the world suggest
at least 50% chance of missing out a congenital deaf child if Universal Neonatal Hearing Screening is not practiced.
Conclusion
In order to ensure that early detection and effective intervention are possible for all neonates with hearing impairment, UNHS
should be performed. Three stage UNHS protocol using OAE and BERA showed that the implementation of UNHS for congenital
childhood hearing loss for all neonates in India would be beneficial.
Keywords
Deafness; Infant, Newborn; Hearing Tests; Evoked Potentials, Auditory, Brain Stem; Audiometry, Evoked Response; Otoacoustic
Emissions, Spontaneous