Newborn Hearing Screening and Intervention
Texas state law requires that all newborns receive a hearing screening following birth prior to discharge from the hospital to help identify hearing loss from an early age. It is important to follow-up with an audiologist as soon as possible if your child does not pass their newborn hearing screening to either rule out hearing loss or immediately begin intervention services for your child.
For infants who do not receive a newborn hearing screening at the time of birth, Texas Hearing Institute also offers newborn hearing screenings.
Our audiologists will complete newborn hearing screenings and follow-up diagnostic evaluations using a test called an auditory brainstem response (ABR) evaluation.
How is the ABR completed?
An ABR looks at how well your child’s ears and auditory pathways respond to different sounds.
The audiologist will clean the skin of your child's forehead and behind their ears with a small pad. Next, the audiologist will place small stickers called electrodes on these areas to measure activity from the brain in response to sounds. Small earphones will be placed in the infants’ ears to play soft clicking sounds at various pitches. The audiologist will use a computer to monitor the brain’s responses to these sounds and determine whether the infant has hearing loss.
The appointment is scheduled for 2 hours. The ABR test itself does not take 2 hours to complete; however, we allow extra time in case your baby wakes up and needs to fall back asleep. This will also give us time to discuss the results of the evaluation.
To capture the most accurate information and results from an ABR, your child must be asleep, still, and quiet during the test, so it’s best if you do not let your child sleep 2 to 4 hours before the ABR evaluation so they’ll be more likely to fall and stay asleep during the appointment. It may be helpful to bring an extra caregiver along to help keep the baby awake during the ride to the clinic. You may also want to wait to feed your baby until the appointment starts to help them sleep.
If your child does not sleep long enough to complete the ABR testing, the ABR will be rescheduled for another day.
The Importance of Early Intervention
Long before children learn to speak, babies learn language by hearing it. From the day they are born, infants listen to the sounds, speech, and songs in their environment and use this information to learn to speak as they grow older. Earlier diagnosis of hearing loss leads to earlier fitting of hearing technology, such as hearing aids or cochlear implants, and earlier access to important services and therapies. Studies have shown the most important stage of language development occurs before age 3, and early intervention results in significantly better language ability for children with hearing loss. Parents of children with hearing loss have many communication options available to them, including listening and spoken language as well as manual forms of communication including American Sign Language. For parents who are interested in pursuing listening and spoken language, the best results are most achievable in children who have early spoken language therapy and education, which is exactly what Texas Hearing Institute offers through our auditory-verbal therapy program and Melinda Webb School.
What Comes Next?
If your child has been diagnosed with hearing loss, your audiologist will work with you and your family to determine what options may be available to ensure your baby has access to language. These options may include hearing technology, such as hearing aids or cochlear implants, speech therapy, and/or American Sign Language. They may encourage you to follow-up with additional healthcare professionals, including ear, nose, and throat (ENT), speech-language pathology, ophthalmology and/or early intervention. Our audiology team and our newborn hearing screening advocate will be with you every step of the way to ensure that your child receives the necessary intervention to reach their full potential.
Newborn Hearing Screening in Houston, TX
All of our services are provided on a sliding fee scale and we accept most insurance and Medicaid plans.
