DD failed hearing test

amother

Wed, Jul 28 2010, 8:58 pm

and tompanogram (sp?) showed no fluid in the ear.I have a follow-up appt with an ent, but until then, can anyone tell me what this could mean? She's 6 yrs old, and I'm so scared.,

gold21

Wed, Jul 28 2010, 9:06 pm

what prompted the visit to the hearing specialist?

Barbara

Wed, Jul 28 2010, 9:09 pm

And why an ENT, rather than an audiologist?

amother

Wed, Jul 28 2010, 9:26 pm

She was having difficulty hearing, so we were told to test by our ped. The audiologist referred us to an ent.

amother

Wed, Jul 28 2010, 9:29 pm

My dc was diagnosed at 6 with hearing loss. Follow up with the ENT, have a second hearing test done. Has she been functioning well as is or did you test because of a concern?

amother

Wed, Jul 28 2010, 9:32 pm

I was slow typing. I saw your above post. How badly did she not pass? Did they tell you numbers or show you the chart? Tell you mild/moderate/ etc?

amother

Wed, Jul 28 2010, 9:38 pm

Amazingly, she is at the top of her class, and even though she just completed preschool where only the aleph bais is taught, she picked up on kriah from her older siblings and and actually reads in an aleph-bais sefer! She always knew her parsha great. We were alarmed when she didn't respond to her name being called only after yelling. Her first HT she failed massively, but that was due to lots of fluid in the ear. Today was her second one, the numbers better, but still bad.

amother

Wed, Jul 28 2010, 9:39 pm

amother wrote:

My dc was diagnosed at 6 with hearing loss. Follow up with the ENT, have a second hearing test done. Has she been functioning well as is or did you test because of a concern?

What did you do about it?

Rodent

Wed, Jul 28 2010, 9:45 pm

A flat tympanogram indicates that the ear drum isn't moving with sound waves as it should. It generally means glue ear or similar. I am guessing that this is why there is a referral to an ENT. A tympanogram isn't a hearing test as such either, but failing one indicates middle ear issues that generally result in reduced hearing capacity. An audiologist should be able to use special devices such as bone conductors to bypass the middle ear to test for underlying hearing problems if regular hearing is impaired which give an ENT a better idea of if it is only middle ear related or not. They managed this on my 11 month old so I presume they did this on your 6 year old?

Please try to relax, it's usually something pretty basic. There are rare exceptions of course but it's likely nothing of huge concern. All of my kids failed every tympanogram and every hearing test until they had grommets/tubes and the older 2 finally passed after they got them (have more checks to come though). #3 gets his grommets/tubes next week.

Rodent

Wed, Jul 28 2010, 9:50 pm

Reread your post, so there is no fluid but still failed a tympanogram, is that the issue?

Did they do an actual hearing test to determine what level she is hearing at? A tympanogram doesn't show that.

ETA - And if there is underlying hearing loss I know it's not ideal but with assistance such as a hearing aid they can do very well. I know several kids with one or two hearing aids, various levels of loss, but all function pretty well.

Marion

Thu, Jul 29 2010, 1:25 pm

Our tympanogram issue is usually wax build-up. Now we see the ENT BEFORE the hearing tests...but he still has hearing loss in one ear.

amother

Thu, Jul 29 2010, 1:34 pm

Thgis time she actually past the tympanogram, and there was no fluid visible to the audiologist when examining dd's ear. And yet she failed the hearing test. This is why I'm so frightened. Why would dd have hearing loss?

amother

Thu, Jul 29 2010, 1:36 pm

Sorry typo.

This time she "passed" the tymp..

amother

Thu, Jul 29 2010, 1:53 pm

amother wrote:

My dc was diagnosed at 6 with hearing loss. Follow up with the ENT, have a second hearing test done. Has she been functioning well as is or did you test because of a concern?

What did you do about it?

Best as we can tell the hearing loss happened after a virus with high fever. We use the special ed services for the hard of hearing. It is extra therapy to help teach focusing techniques and skills. A little extra help with learning reading. And speech therapy. DC was around 1 1/2 when had the bad virus - must have lost the normal hearing so there wasn't a good language base already set up. (We thought it was fluid in the ers all the years between). There is a unit that looks like a mp3 with headset that is good for the classroom in mild to moderate hearing loss or hearing aids if its moderate or above. It also depends on the type of hearing loss - which frequencies.

It is very shocking to get a diagnosis and until it sets in to your mind but b"h it is manageable and does not affect life in a very big way. At least now help can be provided that you know its needed. After we knew for sure I just kept telling myself that dc is no different today than yesterday and so now we know whats already happened for a long while. Its old news just news to me. I dont really know why but it helped me put things into perspective and calm down.

amother

Thu, Jul 29 2010, 2:08 pm

I know I'm being silly asking this here versus a dr, but I'm trying to cope till we see an ent. Could it still be temp hearing loss? Can anything else be why she fails the test?