What to ask audiologist at toddler's evaluation?

May 15, 2006

Hi. My name is Nina and I'm new to this group. We susepct that our

son, who will be 18 months old tomorrow, may be hearing impaired. We

have an appointment with a pediatric audiologist tomorrow to have him

examined and evaluated. What types of questions should I ask him?

What should I expect from the appointment? What types of treatment

are considered positive or negative in your opinion?

A little history: Our son, Jack, doesn't always acknowledge or respond

to loud noises. Two months ago at his last checkup, his pediatrician

said " I don't think he can hear us. " Jack had his back to us and was

playing with the cabinet door under the sink in the exam room. The

doctor and I spent ten minutes trying to get his attention by making

noises and calling his name, but he never turned around. Later during

the exam he through a temper tantrum and the doctor said, " well that's

your problem " . So I figured that he was just hard headed. But then

last week my MIL was watching Jack and she began to suspect that he

couldn't hear. They were in the yard. A plane flew overhead. It was

very loud. She was amazed that Jack didn't look up to see it. Later

in the evening I dropped a spoon on the floor behind Jack and he

didn't flinch. That is what prompted me to call the audiologist.

Thank you in advance for your advice!

May 15, 2006

Hi, Nina,

Wow, you are very proactive, connecting with other parents even before you

have the definitive diagnosis! I'm sure you have a little anxiety about your

visit tomorrow; I'm glad you're seeing a pediatric audie, since that should

give you a better result.

As for the testing, my guess (based on my experience) is that Jack will go

into a booth with another person, and will be tested for how he responds to

sounds, either by turning his head to a moving stuffed animal, or dropping

items in a bucket. They will probably test one ear at a time. They should be

able to tell you how much hearing he has in each ear, which will then

determine the treatment.

If he does have a hearing loss, it then is really up to you as to how you

want to treat it. The audie will certainly give you their recommendations,

but feel free to come back here to ask more questions. I really don't want

to overwhelm you with information while you are still trying to absorb the

hearing issue, but there are some great books you may want to look at

(Choices in Deafness, When Your Child is Deaf are two), there are plenty of

different hearing aids out there to aid different losses; there is cochlear

implant surgery. It really depends what kind of loss Jack has (sensorineural

or conductive, or a mix of both), how much of a loss,etc.

But what you should know is, even if he has a hearing loss, he can be

treated and he will be a regular boy. You will still love him, and he will

still be the same kid.

Good luck tomorrow, and let us know what happens.

Stefanie

Mom to Ben, 7, severe/profound HOH, and Isabella, 10, mild loss

on 5/15/06 8:58 AM, Nina525 at nina525@... wrote:

> Hi. My name is Nina and I'm new to this group. We susepct that our

> son, who will be 18 months old tomorrow, may be hearing impaired. We

> have an appointment with a pediatric audiologist tomorrow to have him

> examined and evaluated. What types of questions should I ask him?

> What should I expect from the appointment? What types of treatment

> are considered positive or negative in your opinion?

>

> A little history: Our son, Jack, doesn't always acknowledge or respond

> to loud noises. Two months ago at his last checkup, his pediatrician

> said " I don't think he can hear us. " Jack had his back to us and was

> playing with the cabinet door under the sink in the exam room. The

> doctor and I spent ten minutes trying to get his attention by making

> noises and calling his name, but he never turned around. Later during

> the exam he through a temper tantrum and the doctor said, " well that's

> your problem " . So I figured that he was just hard headed. But then

> last week my MIL was watching Jack and she began to suspect that he

> couldn't hear. They were in the yard. A plane flew overhead. It was

> very loud. She was amazed that Jack didn't look up to see it. Later

> in the evening I dropped a spoon on the floor behind Jack and he

> didn't flinch. That is what prompted me to call the audiologist.

>

> Thank you in advance for your advice!

May 15, 2006

My daughter is just a month younger than your son. She has a hearing

loss that was identified at birth. We are very familiar with booth

testing. Our audiologist did tell us that testing from 18 months to

about 2 years is very difficult, just due to the age and stage of

development a child is.

Our daughter gets booth testing often. She will sit on my lap in the

booth with one person in front of us who will keep her attention with a

toy while another audiologist will be outside the booth at the controls.

First, they condition n by making a sound and moving the toy

towards the sound and waving the toy close to what they want her to look

at when she hears the sound. After doing that a couple times, they try

making sounds and talking to her to get her to turn towards the sound.

Right now, when she turns there are flashing lights and an elephant

playing the drums. Our audiologist is getting ready to get a new system

with video screens. She says we will be able to bring in a favorite

video that will play when n looks when the sound is played.

One thing my audiologist warned about is testing too long with kids this

young. You have to watch for when they quit " playing the game " of

turning their heads. She said it can be easy to start reading into

movements if you test too long. Usually, our appointments are not very

long because we only test until n quits. So, if you have a good

audiologist, you may not be in the booth very long and will probably

need to go in for more testing. Hopefully, you will be successful

enough for the audiologist to be able to tell whether there is a loss,

but you probably won't be able to know how severe for sure that day.

Please ask this list as many questions as you think of, and just read

what is here. Often, I have found answers to questions I did not know I

had yet while reading other posts.

in Manassas, VA

>

> > Hi. My name is Nina and I'm new to this group. We susepct that our

> > son, who will be 18 months old tomorrow, may be hearing impaired. We

> > have an appointment with a pediatric audiologist tomorrow to have him

> > examined and evaluated. What types of questions should I ask him?

> > What should I expect from the appointment? What types of treatment

> > are considered positive or negative in your opinion?

> >

> > A little history: Our son, Jack, doesn't always acknowledge or respond

> > to loud noises. Two months ago at his last checkup, his pediatrician

> > said " I don't think he can hear us. " Jack had his back to us and was

> > playing with the cabinet door under the sink in the exam room. The

> > doctor and I spent ten minutes trying to get his attention by making

> > noises and calling his name, but he never turned around. Later during

> > the exam he through a temper tantrum and the doctor said, " well that's

> > your problem " . So I figured that he was just hard headed. But then

> > last week my MIL was watching Jack and she began to suspect that he

> > couldn't hear. They were in the yard. A plane flew overhead. It was

> > very loud. She was amazed that Jack didn't look up to see it. Later

> > in the evening I dropped a spoon on the floor behind Jack and he

> > didn't flinch. That is what prompted me to call the audiologist.

> >

> > Thank you in advance for your advice!

>

> All messages posted to this list are private and confidential. Each post is

the intellectual property of the author and therefore subject to copyright

restrictions.

>

May 15, 2006

Nina,

As you can see, you've landed in a very supportive and informative place.

Lots of people here have been in your shoes and can give you great advice and

pointers. Good luck at the appointment and please come back and let us know

how it goes.

Our family has no experience with early intervention, but as you can

already see, plenty of people here have. Our son Ian is now 15 , a high school

freshman, and we didn't learn of his hearing loss until he was in 2nd grade. His

is a hearing loss that progresses slowly, so we don't know when it started.

Our D/HOH (deaf/ hard of hearing) kids are amazingly resilient, so don't

worry too much. As for being hard headed and stubborn ... I gave birth to two of

those kinds of kids. Small wonder since stubbornness runs on both sides of

the family, LOL.

Think of it as a positive thing. Being stubborn means Jack will accomplish

whatever he sets him mind to do. Sounds like a positive trait to me (grin)

Welcome to the list -- Jill

May 15, 2006

Hi Nina - welcome. I'm Barbara - I have two boys who are 13 and 11 -

both are deaf. The things you're describing sound so similar to what we

went through with Tom (our oldest). Tom wasn't screened at birth

(actually neither of my boys were) and actually was hitting " talking "

milestones so we didn't really suspect until he was about 3 and when he

spoke, he was really hard to understand. I should tell you both my boys

are doing well - Tom's in 7th grade and in our town's middle school. He

just earned his black belt in taekwondo and just about 7 months ago had

surgery for a cochlear implant - that's been great for him! Sam is

ready to " graduate " from our town's elementary school and is my sports

guy - baseball, soccer, basketball. He also studies taekwondo. Being

deaf hasn't slowed either of my guys down.

After we got Tom squared away - he was fitted with hearing aids when he

was 3-1/2 - we then focused on Sam, my younger son, and had him tested.

He was only about 15 months old and just wouldn't cooperate with booth

testing, which is what I'm guessing Jack will have tomorrow. With booth

testing, you and Jack sit in a soundproof booth with an audiologist;

another audiologist is in an adjoining room at the controls. They will

play sounds to see if Jack responds. If they can't get a good reliable

test with booth testing, they may recommend an ABR (audiologic brainstem

response test). It sounds worse than it is! Sam was sedated by the

folks in pediatrics, then taken up to audiology. they attached

electrodes to his head - that correlates then to hearing loss.

You're so far ahead of me when my kids were being tested! Things to ask

if Jack is found to have a hearing loss would be:

* ask for his level of hearing loss - and if possible, get his SRTs

(speech recognition thresholds) from your audiologist. They won't mean

much to you but will to US and we can help you understand what it all means

* does he/she have an idea of type of hearing loss - conductive,

sensorineural, mixed?

* If they know who the early intervention people are for your area, get

that information and call them to get Jack on their schedule

as for treatment, Stefanie just sent an excellent email re: the books

she recommended - I'd recommend them too. Luterman has written

several books that are great for families with kids with hearing loss -

When Your Child is Deaf and The Young Deaf Child are two that are

excellent and so very helpful. There are so many ways to communicate

with your child if they have a hearing loss - much depends on the level

of his hearing loss - and deciding which way to go is very personal.

There's no " right " way to choose communication method and in fact, you

may choose one and then re-choose down the line. Every family and every

child is different. You may want to think about hearing aids for Jack -

if that's the case, it's important to know that each hearing aid company

allows for a 30 day trial period before you have to purchase them.

Please keep us posted - fingers crossed for you and your little guy! If

I can think of anything else, I'll write again. I'm so glad you're

here! This is a wonderful group.

Barbara in soggy New Hampshire

Nina525 wrote: