September 17th,2012
Ryan, todaywe received an official diagnosis of ‘Profound Hearing Loss’ for you. You failed four tests prior to today’smore sophisticated tests, which determined the degree of hearing loss you mayhave. Unfortunately, at alldecibals and at each frequency tested, you do not have any hearing….atall. The audiologist said that youmay (at best) be able to hear an airplane, but only when pretty much standingnext to it.
Today is ahard day for mom and dad. Althoughwe know we will begin the process of pursuing cochlear implants for you, it’shard not to feel sorry for you, and (quite honestly) ourselves. We can only hope that you will stillgrow up with no speech or language issues—so much so that no one can even tellyou are deaf.
To give youmore details, on your birthday your did not pass the standard newborn hearingtest, otherwise known as an AABR. The nurses repeated the tests on August 2nd, and then againon August 16th. You didnot pass those either, so your pediatrician, Dr. Ruth Mooreville from WaynePediatrics referred you to the Nuemors team of audiologists. They also repeated the ABR test onAugust 23rd—you didn’t pass. This team did however determine that your eardrum was fully functionaland that there was no inner ear fluid. At this point your dad and I hoped that even though you failed thesefour tests, that you would still have some level of hearing.
During thenext couple of weeks before your next appointment, we tried to watch you asmuch as possible to see if you ever startled to loud or unexpected noises orwhether you responded to our voices. Although dad held our hope, I really didn’t think you could hearme. You never awoke to Bryce’syelling/screaming/whining, nor did you turn your head when I dropped a loudplate to the tile ground…not even a blink.
So, at yournext appointment today you had an ‘unsedated ABR’ which is anelectrophysiologic measurement that reflect the auditory function from theeighth nerve through the auditory brainstem. This form of ABR testing allowsthe audiologist to determine not only the severity of the hearing loss but alsothe nature of the hearing loss (ie, sensorineural, conductive, or neural) byusing both air and bone conduction stimulation. You also had an Otoacousticemissions test. OAEs areused to assess cochlear integrity and are physiologic measurements of theresponse of the outer hair cells to acoustic stimuli. They serve as a fastobjective screening test for normal preneural cochlear function. Both of which you failed.
On Thursdayyou will have your first appointment with the ENT. We are looking forward to the next steps!
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