An automated hearing screening technique for newborns.
11 182 newborn infants have had their hearing thresholds screened by automatically recording crib motion before and after a test sound. An inexpensive motion transducer translates the baby(s) movements onto a multichannel strip-chart recorder (batch testing) or a single channel recorder (individual testing). Records are read off-line and scored positive if there is a change in movement within 2.5 sec after the test sound. "Passing or failing" a baby requires about one minute's clerical scoring time, and is therefore both economical and simple. We have detected 33 neonates with serious hearing losses and perhaps missed one on long-term follow-up. This amounts to a deafness incidence of 1:329 live births. In the Intensive Care/Premature nurseries the incidence is 1:62.
D001309:Auditory Threshold; D003638:Deafness / Q000151:congenital / Q000175:diagnosis; D005500:Follow-Up Studies; D006311:Hearing Disorders / Q000151:congenital* / Q000175:diagnosis; D006320:Hearing Tests / Q000295:instrumentation / Q000379:methods*; D006801:Humans; D007231:Infant, Newborn; D007232:Infant, Newborn, Diseases / Q000175:diagnosis*; D008403:Mass Screening