|
Ruthie was surrounded by well-meaning professionals, family, and friends, yet her proper diagnosis eluded us for more than a year. Here are some suggestions to follow up on the infant screening process so that children don't slip through the cracks:
-
Because deafness is a low-incidence disability, many otherwise well-trained child development specialists know very little about it. Basic information (like AGBell's "So Your Child Has Hearing Loss: Next Steps for Parents" pamphlet) should be made available to both health professionals and parents if a hearing loss is even remotely indicated.
-
For any hearing issues, pediatricians should direct parents to-and parents should insist on-audiologists and ENTs with special interest in pediatric patients.
-
If speech issues in young children are not significantly improved over a period of six months, parents should seriously consider having their child's hearing (re-)tested. Hearing can deteriorate rapidly.
-
In counseling parents, both ENTs and pediatricians should counter the possible negatives of the ABR test experience with the information that behavioral hearing testing is notoriously unreliable in young children.
-
When a hearing loss is suspected, parents will find the parents of other children who are deaf an invaluable resource of personal experience and perspective.
|