Decreasing test time in newborn hearing screening.

Abstract

This study examined the effect of reducing the number of accepted responses in transiently evoked otoacoustic emissions based on the results of a universal neonatal hearing screening program. Our intention was to decrease the test time of newborns. A total of 464 ears were examined by using a universal newborn hearing-screening program implemented in a private maternity hospital. ILO88 Otodynamics Analyzer Quickscreen program was used for all testing and a two-stage procedure was adopted. In the first stage, the results were continuously evaluated for the 'pass' criteria, during the test, after at least 20 low-noise sweeps had been presented. As soon as the criteria were met, the test was interrupted and the results were recorded. In the second stage of the procedure, the test was continued and finally terminated after 260 quiet samples had been recorded. The results of each stage of this procedure were compared and evaluated. A total of 402 ears had normal otoacoustic emissions and only 62 ears had absent emissions. It was concluded that after a minimum of 20 averaged quiet responses, which we consider necessary in order to record reliable emissions and as soon as the 'pass' criteria were fulfilled the test could be terminated without affecting the 'pass-fail' rates which were similar in both stages. However, we believe that for diagnostic and clinical purposes, all 260 quiet samples must be used, because the results after the second stage indicated statistically better scores in response and reproducibility measures.