Newborn Hearing Screening at Rajavithi Hospital, Thailand: Hearing Loss in Infants Not Admitting in Intensive Care Unit
Viruch Tungvachirakul MD*, Supranee Boonmee RN**, Tawipa Nualmoosik***, Jaruwan Kamjohnjiraphun MSc***, Winya Siripala RN**, Watanee Sanghirun RN**, Supanee mungpol RN**, Araya pangkul RN**, Manus Potaporn MD*
Affiliation : * Center of Excellence in Otolaryngology, Rajavithi Hospital, College of Medicine, Rangsit University, Bangkok, Thailand ** Department of Nursing, Rajavithi Hospital, Bangkok, Thailand *** Center of Excellence in Otolaryngology, Rajavithi Hospital, Bangkok, Thailand
Background : Approximately one to two per 1000 newborns have hearing loss. Delay in detection of this disability leads to
impaired development and may prevent the acquisition of speech. Early screening of hearing in newborns results in children
receiving early language rehabilitation.
Objective : Determine the incidence of infants hearing loss in infants not requiring intensive care.
Material and Method: A prospective descriptive study in hearing loss in infants not requiring intensive care in rajavithi
hospital between 17th January 2008 to 23rd December 2009. Infants were screened with otoacoustic emissions (OAE), the
results were divided into two groups, “pass” and “refer”. The infants who failed the screening test were referred for further
checks with second OAE and if they failed again, then the authors reassessed them with Auditory Steady State Response Test
(ASSR).
Results : There were 508 newborns that needed intensive care out of 5,190 live births. 639 excluded because of unwilling to
join the project. Therefore 4,043 newborns were included in the study. There were 246 (6.1%) newborns who failed the first
screening test but only 189 newborns were tested in second OAE because 57 newborns were lost to follow-up. Twenty one
newborns (11.1%) failed the second test. There were 15 newborn using ASSR for hearing threshold (6 newborns were lost to
follow-up). There were 11 newborn was normal hearing, 2 newborn (rate 49.5: 100,000) was mild hearing and moderate to
severe hearing.
Conclusion : The incidence of moderate to severe hearing loss in newborns who did not require intensive care was very low
(rate 49.5: 100,000). However, screening all newborns with OAE is still valuable because of severe impact to quality of life
of late detection of hearing loss. Evaluation of hearing by ASSR was reliable.
Keywords : Newborn hearing screening, Otoaccoustic emission, Auditory brain stem evoked response, Auditory steady state response
