Babies and young children

In the UK, around 840 babies are born each year with a permanent hearing loss.

If not identified early this can have a devastating effect on language acquisition, communication development, confidence and social skills but with early identification and appropriate support, research shows there is no reason why children cannot develop these skills at a similar rate to their hearing peers.

For many years a babies hearing was tested in the UK using the Infant Distraction test (IDT). This test was performed by health visitors and took place when a baby was about eight months old. The test required babies to react appropriately to different sounds. As there were many factors that could influence the result of the test, for example the baby’s interest in the type of sound and the experience of the testers to recognise ‘false’ turns, the test was not very accurate and failed to identify around half of those with a hearing problem. Around 50% of babies with a hearing loss were not identified until 18 months old, with 25% left undiagnosed at three years old.

Although the importance of early identification has been accepted for many years, it is only in the last few that the technology has become available to objectively determine a child’s hearing ability shortly after birth. This has led to the replacement of the Infant Distraction Test with newborn hearing screening throughout the UK.