Universal Neonatal Hearing Screening

Universal neonatal hearing screening, part of early hearing detection and intervention programmes, refers to those services aimed at screening the hearing of all newborns regardless of the presence of a risk factor for hearing loss. It is the first step in the early hearing detection and intervention program, indicating whether a newborn requires further audiological assessment to determine the presence or absence of permanent hearing loss, using objective testing methods such as otoacoustic emission testing or automated auditory brainstem response testing to screen the hearing of all newborns in a target region. Even in developed countries, until the 1990s it could take years for a hearing impaired child to be diagnosed and benefit from a health intervention and amplification, a delay that can still happen in developing countries, and if children are not exposed to sounds and language in their first years of life because of hearing loss they can have difficulty developing spoken or signed language, with cognitive development and social skills also affected. The screening separates newborns into those with a high index of suspicion, more likely to have permanent congenital hearing loss, and those with a low index of suspicion, with the first group referred for diagnostic testing, and it has been implemented in many regions worldwide since the early 2000s because earlier detection allows earlier intervention, which is more effective since the brain's ability to learn language declines as a child ages; children born with permanent congenital hearing loss have historically performed worse educationally and had poorer language acquisition, social functioning and vocational choices than their hearing peers.