All newborns in the province are now eligible for a quick test that screens for permanent hearing loss.

The hearing test, launched by the Alberta Early Hearing Detection and Intervention (EHDI) Program, screens newborns up until 90 days after birth, though the program aims to have babies screened by the age of one month. 

In 2018, more than 51,500 babies were born in Alberta and each year, between 110 and 160 are born with permanent hearing loss. 

Tanis Howarth, Director of Provincial Audiology with the EHDI program, explains how exactly the hearing test works.

"We have a small handheld computer-like device with an ear tip and the ear tip is placed into the baby's ear, and a complex sound is played into the ear. We can record from that how the ear responds and then determine if an infant is hearing well on the day of screening or not."

Alberta's EHDI program will have a big impact on families and their children's lives. 

"Having a provincial newborn screening program is important. It's really difficult to tell if a child has hearing loss or not at birth and early on. Really relying on speech and language development comes along but takes a while to be able to sort of use that as an indicator," explains Howarth. "So hearing screening allows us right away to look at hearing and know if the baby's hearing well enough to develop language and without it, we really don't know."

Howarth says that the earlier medical professionals can know about hearing loss, the sooner they can work with families to put in place the support that is needed for their child's development. It'll help children affected with hearing loss at a young age be off to a good start in learning language and simply just learning.

The service is currently offered in all 13 neonatal intensive care units in the province, as well as in post-partum units at most hospitals with more than 200 births per year and many community sites. As of now, Airdrie does not yet offer the service in any of it's medical clinics. 

 

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