The Northern Lights Regional Health Centre is now offering a test to screen newborns for permanent hearing loss.
Alberta Health Services (AHS) has launched the Early Hearing Detection & Intervention (EHDI) Program which identifies hearing loss early on and ensures follow-up and support is sooner.
Support includes helping your baby build speech, language and learning skills.
It includes diagnosing permanent hearing loss by three months old and ensuring access to intervention by six months old.
Tanis Howarth, Director of Provincial Audiology noted the importance of the ability to communicate from birth.
“Language, whether spoken or signed, is needed to aid in a child’s overall development. When a baby is born deaf or hard of hearing, their process for developing language is delayed, impacting the child and their family.”
Province-wide, 45 facilities will provide the quick hearing test for free, within 90 days of birth for babies born or living in Alberta.
The screening is quick and pain-free and involves playing soft sounds into the infant’s ears as they are sleeping or quiet while a computer measures its response.
According to AHS permanent hearing loss is one of the most common conditions in newborns.
It also says without screening that the average age of diagnosis is 24 months.
