Utilization of a questionnaire to provide follow-up services in an infant hearing screening program.
An important goal of any neonatal hearing screening program is to provide adequate monitoring and follow-up services for all newborns tested. This is often the most difficult component of the program to administer. An attempt was made to obtain follow-up information through the use of a questionnaire modeled after Jacobson and Jacobson (1990). This questionnaire was administered by mail or telephone to 119 parents whose infants had passed a hearing screening as neonates in four hospitals. Forty-four percent of all parents contacted by either means responded to the questionnaire; however, response rates varied by as much as 36 percent, depending on the hospital in which a child was born. Our results suggest that the successful use of follow-up questionnaires depends greatly upon hospital demographics. When limitations are considered, however, they may provide an alternative to on-site follow-up services for infants who pass initial screening.
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Hearing, Speech, and Vision Services, Arkansas Department of Health, Little Rock 72205.
Gibson
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D006311:Hearing Disorders / Q000175:diagnosis*; D006801:Humans; D007223:Infant; D007231:Infant, Newborn; D015997:Neonatal Screening; D011795:Surveys and Questionnaires