Abstract:

Introduction: Speaking and language ability development of infants improve quickly in the first few months of life. Congenital hearing loss, affects children’s speech, language, social, and cognitive ability negatively. Newborn hearing screening program is very important for the diagnosis of congenital hearing loss early. Otoacoustic emission measurement is currently most common method in the world. Hearing screening results published in our region are not available. In our study, we aimed to present the healthy newborn hearing screening protocol and results.Method: A total of 3412 healthy newborns scanned between March 2012 and September 2013 in Siverek State Hospital by transient evoked otoacoustic emission and scanning method (TEOAE) using Otoport Lite OAE system (Otodynamics Ltd.UK)in the first three days of their life. Failed infants, were called fort he second test 14 days after the first test and examined for debris, cerumen in external auditory canal or middle ear inflammation or effusion. The infants with risk factors were referred to tertiary health center regardless of test results.Results: A total of 656 of 3412 newborns (19.2%) could not pass the first test, 110 of 3412 newborns (3.2%) could not pass the second test and 14 (0.4%) of 3412 newborns could not pass the third tests. These 14 newborns and newborns having a risk factor referred to the tertiary health center for advanced audiological examination.Conclusion: We recommend, to screen hearing abilities of all newborn. Infants who have risk factors for hearing loss should be seperated from normal individuals for advanced audilogical investigations.

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