New born hearing screening was started on a trial basis in Japan in 1997.
Community-based newborn hearing screening started in Nagasaki prefecture in October 2003. We investigated 45,924 infants who underwent universal newborn hearing screening from October 2003 to March 2008.
Ninety-four to ninety-six percent of neonates in Nagasaki prefecture were screened in from 2005 to 2008. The referral rate after the screening process was 0.5–0.7%. The incidence of hearing loss was 0.15–0.20%.
We compared the age in lunar months of the screened and non-screened infants at the time of diagnosis, intervention, fitting of the first hearing aid, and the age of cochlear implantation. The age at the time of diagnosis (p<0.0001), intervention (p<0.0001), fitting of the first hearing aid (p<0.0001), and the age at which cochlear implantation was performed (p=0.0025<0.01) were significantly lower in the screened infants.
These results show that universal new born hearing screening is very useful for early detection of, and intervention for infants with hearing loss.
The integration of medical, educational, and social assistance is very important for infants diagnosed as having hearing loss after newborn hearing screening.